I^^RANK  Herbert  Gage 


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OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 

OF  CALIFORNIA 

LOS  ANGELES 


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DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 


I'.yron  Harmon,  Banff 


MT.  SIR  DONALD,  WHICH  DRAINS  FROM  ALL  SIDES  TO  THE 
COLUMBIA 


DOWN   THE   COLUMBIA 


BY 


LEWIS   R.    FREEMAN 

AUTHOR  OF  "IN  THE  TRACKS  OF  THE  TRADES, 
"  HELL'S  HATCHES,"  ETC. 


WITH   ILLUSTRATIONS 
FROM   PHOTOGRAPHS 


NEW  YORK 
DODD,  MEAD  AND  COMPANY 

1921 


Copyright  1921 
By  DODD,  mead  AND  COMPANY,  Inc. 


V^  Quinn  &  IBoben    Companp 

BOOK       MANUFACTURERS 
RAHWAY  NEW     JERSEY 


TO 
C.  L.  CHESTER 

Hoping  he  will  find  in  these  pages 
some  compensation  for  the  fun 
he   missed    in    not    being    along. 


1 2G890 I 


INTRODUCTION 

The  day  on  which  I  first  conceived  the  idea  of  a 
boat  trip  down  the  Columbia  hangs  in  a  frame  all  its 
own  in  the  corridors  of  my  memory.  It  was  a  number 
of  years  ago — more  than  a  dozen,  I  should  say.  Just 
previously  I  had  contrived  somehow  to  induce  the  Su- 
perintendent of  the  Yellowstone  National  Park  to 
grant  me  permission  to  attempt  a  winter  journey  on 
ski  around  this  most  beautiful  of  America's  great 
playgrounds.  He  had  even  sent  a  Government  scout 
along  to  keep,  or  help,  me  out  of  trouble.  We  were  a 
week  out  from  the  post  at  Mammoth  Hot  Springs. 

Putting  the  rainbow  revel  of  the  incomparable  Can- 
yon behind,  we  had  crossed  Yellowstone  Lake  on  the 
ice  and  fared  onward  and  upward  until  we  came  at 
last  to  the  long  climb  where  the  road  under  its  ten 
feet  of  snow  wound  up  to  the  crest  of  the  Continental 
Divide.  It  was  so  dry  and  cold  that  the  powdery 
snow  overlying  the  crust  rustled  under  our  ski  like 
autumn  leaves.  The  air  was  diamond  clear,  so  trans- 
parent that  distant  mountain  peaks,  juggled  in  the 
wizardry  of  the  lens  of  the  light,  seemed  fairly  to 
float  upon  the  eyeball. 

At  the  summit,  where  we  paused  for  breath,  an  old 
Sergeant  of  the  Game  Patrol,  letting  down  a  tin  can 
on  a  string,  brought  up  drinks  from  an  air-hole  which 
he  claimed  was  teetering  giddily  upon  the  very  ridge- 
pole of  North  America. 

*'If  I  dip  to  the  left,"  he  said,  suiting  the  action  to 


viii  INTRODUCTION 

the  word,  "it's  the  Pacific  I'll  be  robbing  of  a  pint  of 
Rocky  Mountain  dew;  while  if  I  dip  to  the  right  it's 
the  Atlantic  that'll  have  to  settle  back  a  notch.  And 
if  I  had  a  string  long  enough,  and  a  wing  strong 
enough,  to  cast  my  can  over  there  beyond  Jackson's 
Hole,"  he  went  on,  pointing  southeasterly  to  the 
serrated  peaks  of  the  Wind  River  JNIountains,  "I 
could  dip  from  the  fount  of  the  Green  River  and  keep 
it  from  feeding  the  Colorado  and  the  Gulf  of  Califor- 
nia by  so  much." 

That  led  me  to  raise  the  question  of  boating  by 
river  from  the  Great  Divide  to  the  sea,  and  the  Scout, 
who  knew  something  of  the  Madison,  Jefferson  and 
Gallatin  to  the  east,  and  of  the  Salmon,  Clearwater 
and  Snake  to  the  west,  said  he  reckoned  the  thing 
could  be  done  in  either  direction  provided  a  man  had 
lots  of  time  and  no  dependent  family  to  think  of  and 
shake  his  nerve  in  the  pinches. 

The  old  Sergeant  agreed  heartily.  River  boating 
was  good,  he  said,  because  it  was  not  opposed  to  Na- 
ture, like  climbing  mountains,  for  instance,  where  you 
were  bucking  the  law  of  gravity  from  start  to  finish. 
With  a  river  it  was  all  easy  and  natural.  You  just 
got  into  your  boat  and  let  it  go.  Sooner  or  later, 
without  any  especial  effort  on  your  part,  you  reached 
your  objective.  You  might  not  be  in  a  condition  to 
appreciate  the  fact,  of  course,  but  just  the  same  you 
got  there,  and  with  a  minimum  of  hard  work.  Some 
rivers  were  better  for  boating  than  others  for  the 
reason  that  you  got  there  quicker.  The  Snake  and 
the  Missouri  were  all  very  well  in  their  way,  but  for 
him,  he'd  take  the  Columbia.    There  was  a  river  that 


INTRODUCTION  ix 

started  in  mountains  and  finished  in  mountains.  It 
ran  in  mountains  all  the  way  to  the  sea.  No  slack 
water  in  all  its  course.  It  was  going  somewhere  all 
the  time.  He  had  lived  as  a  kid  on  the  lower  Columbia 
and  had  trapped  as  a  man  on  the  upper  Columbia ;  so 
he  ought  to  know.  There  was  a  "he"  river  if  there 
ever  was  one.  If  a  man  really  wanted  to  travel  from 
snowflake  to  brine  and  not  be  troubled  with  "on-wee" 
on  the  way,  there  was  no  stream  that  ran  one-two- 
three  with  the  Columbia  as  a  means  of  doing  it. 

That  night,  where  we  steamed  in  the  black  depths  of 
a  snow-submerged  Government  "Emergency"  cabin, 
the  Sergeant's  old  Columbia  memories  thawed  with 
the  hunk  of  frosted  beef  he  was  toasting  over  the 
sheet-iron  stove.  He  told  of  climbing  for  sheep  and 
goat  in  the  high  Kootenay,  of  trailing  moose  and  car- 
ibou in  the  valleys  of  the  Rockies,  and  finally  of  his 
years  of  trapping  on  the  creeks  and  in  the  canyons  that 
run  down  to  the  Big  Bend  of  the  Columbia;  of  how  he 
used  to  go  down  to  Kinbasket  Lake  in  the  Fall,  port- 
aging or  lining  the  three  miles  of  tumbling  cascades  at 
Surprise  Rapids,  trap  all  winter  on  Sullivan  Creek 
or  Middle  River,  and  then  come  out  in  the  Spring  to 
Revelstoke,  playing  ducks-and-drakes  with  his  life 
and  his  scarcely  less  valuable  catch  of  marten,  mink 
and  beaver  running  the  riffles  at  Rock  Slide,  Twelve 
Mile  and  the  terrible  Dalles  des  Morts.  He  declared 
that  there  were  a  hundred  miles  of  the  Big  Bend  of  the 
Columbia  that  had  buffaloed  to  a  fare-ye-well  any 
equal  stretch  on  any  of  the  great  rivers  of  North 
America  for  fall,  rocks  and  wild  rip-rarin'  water  gen- 
erally.    But  the  dread  Rapids  of  Death  and  the 


X  INTRODUCTION 

treacherous  swirls  and  eddies  of  Revelstoke  Canyon 
were  not  the  last  of  swift  water  by  a  long  shot.  Just 
below  the  defile  of  the  Arrow  Lakes  the  white  caps 
began  to  rear  their  heads  again,  and  from  there  right 
on  down  through  the  seven  hundred  miles  and  more 
to  tide-water  below  the  Cascade  Locks  in  Oregon 
there  was  hardly  a  stretch  of  ten  miles  without  its 
tumble  of  rapids,  and  mostly  they  averaged  not  more 
than  three  or  four  miles  apart. 

"She's  sure  some  'he'  river,"  the  old  chap  con- 
cluded as  he  began  to  unroll  his  blankets,  "going  some- 
where all  the  time,  tumbling  over  itself  all  the  way 
trying  to  beat  itself  to  the  finish." 

Confusing  as  the  Sergeant  was  with  his  "he"  and 
"she"  and  "it"  as  to  the  gender  of  the  mighty  Oregon, 
there  was  no  question  of  the  fascination  of  the  pic- 
tures conjured  up  by  his  descriptions  of  that  so-well- 
called  "Achilles  of  Rivers."  Before  I  closed  my  eyes 
that  night  I  had  promised  myself  that  I  should  take 
the  first  opportunity  to  boat  the  length  of  the  Colum- 
bia, to  follow  its  tumultuous  course  from  its  glacial 
founts  to  the  salt  sea  brine,  to  share  with  it,  to  jostle 
it  in  its  "timible  to  get  there  first." 

I  held  by  that  resolve  for  more  than  a  dozen  years, 
although,  by  a  strange  run  of  chance,  I  was  destined  to 
have  some  experience  of  almost  every  one  of  the  great 
rivers  of  the  world  before  I  launched  a  boat  upon  the 
Columbia.  My  appetite  for  swift  water  boating  had 
grown  by  what  it  fed  on.  I  had  come  more  and  more 
to  the  way  of  thinking  of  my  Yellowstone  companion 
who  held  that  boating  down  rivers  was  good  because 
it  was  not  opposed  to  Nature,  "like  mountain  climb- 


INTRODUCTION  xi 

ing,  for  instance,  where  you  bucked  the  law  of  gravity- 
all  the  way."  In  odd  craft  and  various,  and  of  diverse 
degree  of  water  worthiness,  I  had  trusted  to  luck  and 
the  law  of  gravity  to  land  me  somewhere  to  seaward 
of  numerous  up-river  points  of  vantage  to  which  I  had 
attained  by  means  of  travel  that  ranged  all  the  way 
from  foot  and  donkey-back  to  elephant  and  auto.  The 
Ichang  gorges  of  the  Yangtze  I  had  run  in  a  sampan 
manned  by  a  yelling  crew  of  Szechuan  coolies,  and  the 
Salween  and  Irawadi  below  the  Yunnan  boundary 
in  weird  Burmese  canoes  whose  crews  used  their  legs 
as  well  as  their  arms  in  plying  their  carved  paddles. 
I  had  floated  down  the  Tigris  from  Diarbekir  to 
Mosul  on  a  kalek  of  inflated  sheepskins,  and  the  Nile 
below  the  Nyanzas  in  a  cranky  craft  of  zebra  hide, 
whose  striped  sides  might  have  suggested  the  idea  of 
modern  marine  camouflage.  On  the  middle  Niger  I 
had  used  a  condemned  gunboat's  life-raft,  and  on  the 
Zambesi  a  dugout  of  saffron-tinted  wood  so  heavy 
that  it  sank  like  iron  when  capsized.  And  it  had  been 
in  native  dugouts  of  various  crude  types  that  I  had 
boated  greater  or  lesser  lengths  of  the  swifter  upper 
stretches  of  the  Orinoco,  Amazon  and  Parana. 

But  through  it  all — whether  I  was  floating  in  a 
reed-wrapped  balsa  on  Titacaca  or  floundering  in  a 
pitch-smeared  gufa  on  the  Euphrates — pictures  con- 
jured up  by  remembered  phrases  of  the  old  ex-trap- 
per keep  rising  at  the  back  of  my  brain.  "The  big 
eddy  at  the  bend  of  Surprise  Rapids,  where  you  go 
to  look  for  busted  boats  and  dead  bodies;"  "the 
twenty-one  mile  of  white  water  rolling  all  the  way 
from  Kinbasket  Lake  to  Canoe  River;"  "the  double 


xii  INTRODUCTION 

googly  intake  at  the  head  of  Gordon  Rapid;"  "the 
black-mouthed  whirlpool  waiting  like  a  wild  cat  at 
the  foot  of  Dalles  des  Morts" — how  many  times  had  I 
seen  all  these  in  fancy!  And  at  last  the  time  came 
when  those  pictures  were  to  be  made  real — galvanized 
into  life. 

It  was  well  along  toward  the  end  of  last  summer 
that  my  friend  C.  L.  Chester,  whose  work  in  filming 
the  scenic  beauties  of  out-of-the-way  parts  of  the 
world  has  made  the  name  Chester-Outing  Pictures  a 
byword  on  both  sides  of  the  Atlantic,  mentioned  that 
he  was  sending  one  of  his  cameramen  to  photograph 
the  sources  of  the  Columbia  in  the  Selkirks  and 
Rockies  of  western  Canada.  Also  that  he  was  think- 
ing of  taking  his  own  holiday  in  that  incomparably 
beautiful  region.  He  supposed  I  knew  that  there 
were  considerable  areas  here  that  had  barely  been  ex- 
plored, to  saying  nothing  of  photographed.  This  was 
notably  so  of  the  Big  Bend  countiy,  where  the  Co- 
lumbia had  torn  its  channel  between  the  Rockies  and 
Selkirks  and  found  a  way  down  to  the  Arrow  Lakes. 
He  was  especially  anxious  to  take  some  kind  of  a  boat 
round  the  hundred  and  fifty  miles  of  canyon  between 
Beavermouth  and  Revelstoke  and  bring  out  the  first 
movies  of  what  he  had  been  assured  was  the  roughest 
stretch  of  swift  water  on  any  of  the  important  rivers 
of  the  world.  Was  there,  by  any  chance,  a  possibility 
that  my  plans  and  commitments  were  such  that  I 
would  be  free  to  join  him  in  the  event  that  he  made  the 
trip  personally? 

As  a  matter  of  fact  there  were  several  things  that 
should  have  prevented  my  breaking  away  for  a  trip  to 


INTRODUCTION  xiii 

the  upper  Columbia  in  September,  not  the  least  among 
which  was  a  somewhat  similar  trip  I  had  already 
planned  for  the  Grand  Canyon  of  the  Colorado  that 
very  month.  But  the  mention  of  the  Big  Bend  was 
decisive.  "I'll  go,"  I  said  promptly.  "When  do  you 
start?" 

It  was  finally  arranged  that  I  should  go  on  ahead 
and  engage  men  and  boats  for  the  Big  Bend  part  of 
the  trip,  while  Chester  would  endeavour  to  disentan- 
gle himself  from  business  in  Los  Angeles  and  New 
York  in  time  to  join  his  cameraman  and  myself  for  a 
jaunt  by  packtrain  to  the  Lake  of  the  Hanging 
Glaciers.  The  latter  is  one  of  the  high  glacial  sources 
of  the  Columbia  in  the  Selkirks,  and  Chester,  learning 
that  it  had  never  been  photographed,  desired  especially 
to  visit  it  in  person.  Returning  from  our  visit  to  the 
source  of  the  river,  we  planned  to  embark  on  the  boat- 
ing voyage  around  the  Big  Bend.  It  was  not  until 
business  finally  intervened  to  make  it  impossible  for 
Chester  to  get  away  for  even  a  portion  of  the  trip 
which  he  had  been  at  such  trouble  to  plan,  that  I 
decided  to  attempt  the  voyage  down  the  Columbia  as 
I  had  always  dreamed  of  it — all  the  way  from  the 
eternal  snows  to  tidewater.  At  Chester's  suggestion, 
it  was  arranged  that  his  cameraman  should  accom- 
pany me  during  such  portion  of  the  journey  as  the 
weather  was  favourable  to  moving  picture  work. 

Our  preliminary  work  and  exploration  among  the 
sources  of  the  river  over  (this  was  carried  on  either 
on  foot  or  by  packtrain,  or  in  runs  by  canoe  over  short 
navigable  stretches  of  the  upper  river),  we  pushed 
off  from  Beavermouth,  at  the  head  of  the  Big  Bend. 


xiv  INTRODUCTION 

For  this  most  arduous  part  of  the  voyage  there  were 
four  in  the  party,  with  a  big  double-ended  boat  spe- 
cially built  for  rough  water.  Further  down,  for  a 
considerable  stretch,  we  were  three,  in  a  skiff.  Then, 
for  a  couple  of  hundred  miles,  there  were  four  of 
us  again,  manning  a  raft  and  a  towing  launch.  After 
that  we  were  two — just  the  cameraman  and  myself, 
with  the  skiff.  Him  I  finally  dropped  at  the  foot  of 
Priest  Rapids,  fifty  miles  above  Pasco,  and  the  last 
two  hundred  and  fifty  miles  down  to  Portland  I  rode 
alone.  This  "solo"  run — though  a  one-man  boat  crew 
is  kept  rather  too  busy  in  swift  water  to  have  much 
time  for  enjoying  the  scenery — was  far  from  proving 
the  least  interesting  period  of  the  journey. 

So  far  as  I  have  been  able  to  learn,  my  arrival  in 
Portland  marked  the  end  of  the  first  complete  journey 
that  has  been  made  from  the  glacial  sources  of  the 
Columbia  to  tidewater.  David  Thompson,  scientist 
and  explorer  for  the  Northwest  Company,  racing 
against  the  Astor  sea  expedition  to  be  first  to  establish 
a  post  at  the  mouth  of  the  Columbia,  boated  down  a 
very  large  part  of  the  navigable  part  of  the  river  over 
a  hundred  years  ago.  I  have  found  no  evidence,  how- 
ever, that  he  penetrated  to  the  glacial  fields  in  the 
Selkirks  above  Windermere  and  Columbia  Lake  from 
which  spring  the  main  feeders  of  the  upper  river. 
Thompson's,  and  all  of  the  other  voyages  of  the  early 
days  of  which  there  is  authentic  record,  started  from 
Boat  Encampment,  where  the  road  from  the  plains 
and  Montreal  led  down  to  the  Columbia  by  the  icy 
waters  of  Portage  River,  or,  as  it  is  now  called.  Wood 
River.    Thus  all  of  the  old  Hudson  Bay  and  North- 


INTRODUCTION  xv 

west  voyageurs  ran  only  the  lower  seventy-five  miles 
of  the  Big  Bend,  and  avoided  what  is  by  far  its  worst 
water — Surprise  Rapids  and  the  twenty-one  miles  of 
cascades  below  Kinbasket  Lake.  Ross  Cox,  Alexan- 
der Ross  and  Franchiere,  whose  diaries  are  the  best 
commentaries  extant  upon  early  Columbia  history, 
had  no  experience  of  the  river  above  Boat  Encamp- 
ment. Lewis  and  Clark,  and  Hunt,  with  the  rem- 
nants of  the  Astor  transcontinental  party,  boated  the 
river  only  below  the  Snake,  and  this  was  also  true  of 
Whitman  and  the  other  early  missionaries  and  set- 
tlers. Fremont  made  only  a  few  days'  journey  down 
the  river  from  the  Dalles. 

Of  recent  down-river  passages,  I  have  been  able  to 
learn  of  no  voyageur  who,  having  rounded  the  Big 
Bend,  continued  his  trip  down  to  the  lower  Columbia. 
The  most  notable  voyage  of  the  last  three  or  four 
decades  was  that  of  Captain  F.  P.  Armstrong  and 
J.  P.  Forde,  District  Engineer  of  the  Department  of 
Public  Works  of  Nelson,  British  Columbia,  who, 
starting  at  the  foot  of  the  Lower  Arrow  Lake  in  a 
Peterboro  canoe,  made  the  run  to  Pasco,  just  above 
the  mouth  of  the  Snake,  in  ten  days.  As  Captain 
Armstrong  already  knew  the  upper  Columbia  above 
the  Arrow  Lakes  from  many  years  of  steamboating 
and  prospecting,  and  as  both  he  and  Mr.  Forde,  after 
leaving  their  canoe  at  Pasco,  continued  on  to  Astoria 
by  steamer,  I  am  fully  convinced  that  his  knowledge 
of  that  river  from  source  to  mouth  is  more  comprehen- 
sive than  that  of  any  one  else  of  the  present  genera- 
tion. This  will  be,  perhaps,  a  fitting  place  to  ac- 
knowledge my  obligation  to  Captain  Armstrong  (who 


xvi  INTRODUCTION 

accompanied  me  in  person  from  the  mouth  of  the 
Kootenay  to  the  mouth  of  the  Spokane)  for  advice 
and  encouragement  which  were  very  considerable  fac- 
tors in  the  ultimate  success  of  my  venture.  To  Mr. 
Forde  I  am  scarcely  less  indebted  for  his  courtesy  in 
putting  at  my  disposal  a  copy  of  his  invaluable  report 
to  the  Canadian  Government  on  the  proposal  to  open 
the  Columbia  to  through  navigation  to  the  Pacific 
Ocean. 

Compared  to  the  arduous  journeys  of  the  old 
Astorian  and  Hudson  Bay  voyageurs  on  the  Colum- 
bia, my  own  trip — even  though  a  considerably  greater 
length  of  river  was  covered  than  by  any  of  my  prede- 
cessors— was  negligible  as  an  achievement.  Only  in 
rounding  the  Big  Bend  in  Canada  does  the  voyageur 
of  to-day  encounter  conditions  comparable  to  those 
faced  by  those  of  a  hundred,  or  even  fifty  years  ago 
who  set  out  to  travel  on  any  part  of  the  Columbia. 
For  a  hundred  miles  or  more  of  the  Bend,  now  just  as 
much  as  in  years  long  gone  by,  an  upset  with  the  loss 
of  an  outfit  is  more  likely  than  not  to  spell  disaster 
and  probably  tragedy.  But  in  my  own  passage  of  the 
Big  Bend  I  can  claim  no  personal  credit  that  those 
miles  of  tumbling  water  were  run  successfully.  I  was 
entirely  in  the  hands  of  a  pair  of  seasoned  old  river 
hands,  and  merely  pulled  an  oar  in  the  boat  and  did 
a  few  other  things  when  I  was  told. 

But  it  is  on  the  thousand  miles  of  swiftly  flowing 
water  between  the  lower  end  of  the  Big  Bend  and  the 
Pacific  that  conditions  have  changed  the  most  in  fa- 
vour of  the  latter  day  voyageur.  The  rapids  are,  to  be 
sure,  much  as  they  must  have  appeared  to  Thompson, 


INTRODUCTION  xvii 

Ross,  Franchiere  and  their  Indian  contemporaries. 
The  few  rocks  blasted  here  and  there  on  the  lower 
river  in  an  attempt  to  improve  steamer  navigation 
have  not  greatly  simplified  the  problems  of  the  man 
in  a  rowboat  or  canoe.  Nor  is  an  upset  in  any  part  of 
the  Columbia  an  experience  lightly  to  be  courted  even 
to-day.  Even  below  the  Big  Bend  there  are  a  score 
of  places  I  could  name  offhand  where  the  coolest  kind 
of  an  old  river  hand,  once  in  the  water,  would  not  have 
one  chance  in  ten  of  swimming  out.  In  half  a  hundred 
others  he  might  reckon  on  an  even  break  of  crawling 
out  alive.  But  if  luck  were  with  him  and  he  did  reach 
the  bank  with  the  breath  in  his  body,  then  his  troubles 
would  be  pretty  well  behind  him.  Below  the  Cana- 
dian border  there  is  hardly  ten  miles  of  the  river  with- 
out a  farm,  a  village,  or  even  a  town  of  fair  size. 
Food,  shelter  and  even  medical  attention  are  not, 
therefore,  ever  more  than  a  few  hours  away,  so  that 
the  man  who  survives  the  loss  of  his  boat  and  outfit  is 
rarely  in  serious  straits. 

But  in  the  case  of  the  pioneers,  their  troubles  in  like 
instance  were  only  begun.  What  between  hostile 
Indians  and  the  loss  of  their  only  means  of  travel,  the 
chances  were  all  against  their  ever  pulling  out  with 
their  lives.  The  story  of  how  the  vicious  cascade  of 
the  Dalles  des  Morts  won  its  grisly  name,  which  I  will 
set  down  in  its  proper  place,  furnishes  a  telling  in- 
stance in  point. 

It  is  a  callous  traveller  who,  in  strange  lands  and 
seas,  does  not  render  heart  homage  to  the  better  men 
that  have  gone  before  him.  Just  as  you  cannot  sail 
the  Pacific  for  long  without  fancying  that  Cook  and 


xviii  INTRODUCTION 

Drake  and  Anson  are  sharing  your  night  watches,  so 
on  the  Columbia  it  is  Thompson  and  Cox  and  Lewis 
and  Clark  who  come  to  be  your  guiding  spirits.  At 
the  head  of  every  one  of  the  major  rapids  you  land 
just  as  you  know  they  must  have  landed,  and  it  is  as 
through  their  eyes  that  you  survey  the  work  ahead. 
And  when,  rather  against  your  better  judgment,  you 
decide  to  attempt  to  run  a  winding  gorge  where  the 
sides  are  too  steep  to  permit  lining  and  where  a  por- 
tage would  mean  the  loss  of  a  daj^ — you  know  that  the 
best  of  the  men  who  preceded  you  must  have  expe- 
rienced the  same  hollowness  under  the  belt  when  they 
were  forced  to  the  same  decision,  for  were  they  not 
always  gambling  at  longer  odds  than  you  are?  And 
when,  elate  with  the  thrill  of  satisfaction  and  relief 
that  come  from  knowing  that  what  had  been  a  menac- 
ing roar  ahead  has  changed  to  a  receding  growl  astern, 
you  are  inclined  to  credit  yourself  with  smartness  for 
having  run  a  rapid  where  Thompson  lined  or  Ross 
Cox  portaged,  that  feeling  will  not  persist  for  long. 
Sooner  or  later — and  usually  sooner — something  or 
somebody  will  put  you  right.  A  broken  oar  and  all 
but  a  mess-up  in  an  inconsiderable  riffle  was  all  that 
was  needed  to  quench  the  glow  of  pride  that  I  felt 
over  having  won  through  the  roughly  tumbling  left- 
hand  channel  of  Rock  Island  Rapids  with  only  a  short 
length  of  lining.  And  it  was  a  steady-eyed  old  river 
captain  who  brought  me  back  to  earth  the  night  I  told 
him — somewhat  boastfully,  I  fear — that  I  had  slashed 
my  skiff  straight  down  the  middle  of  the  final  pitch 
of  Umatilla  Rapids,  where  Lewis  and  Clark  had  felt 
they  had  to  portage. 


INTRODUCTION  xix 

"But  you  must  not  forget,"  he  said  gently,  with 
just  the  shadow  of  a  smile  softening  the  line  of  his 
firm  lips,  "that  Lewis  and  Clark  had  something  to 
lose  besides  their  lives — that  they  had  irreplaceable 
records  in  their  care,  and  much  work  still  to  do.  It 
was  their  duty  to  take  as  few  chances  as  possible.  But 
they  never  let  the  risk  stop  them  when  there  wasn't 
any  safer  way.  When  you  are  pulling  through  Celilo 
Canal  a  few  days  from  now,  and  being  eased  down  a 
hundred  feet  in  the  locks,  just  remember  that  Lewis 
and  Clark  put  their  whole  outfit  down  the  Tumwater 
and  Five-^Iile  Rapids  of  the  Dalles,  in  either  of  which 
that  skiff  of  yours  would  be  sucked  under  in  half  a 
minute." 

Bulking  insignificantly  as  an  achievement  as  does 
my  trip  in  comparison  with  the  many  Columbia  voy- 
ages, recorded  and  unrecorded,  of  early  days,  it  still 
seems  to  me  that  the  opportunity  I  had  for  a  compre- 
hensive survey  of  this  grandest  scenically  of  all  the 
world's  great  rivers  gives  me  warrant  for  attempting 
to  set  down  something  of  what  I  saw  and  experienced 
during  those  stirring  weeks  that  intervened  between 
that  breathless  moment  when  I  let  the  whole  stream 
of  the  Columbia  trickle  down  my  back  in  a  glacial  ice- 
cave  in  the  high  Selkirks,  and  that  showery  end-of- 
the-afternoon  when  I  pushed  out  into  tidewater  at 
the  foot  of  the  Cascades. 

It  is  scant  enough  justice  that  the  most  gifted  of 
pens  can  do  to  Nature  in  endeavouring  to  picture  in 
words  the  grandest  of  her  manifestations,  and  my  own 
quill,  albeit  it  glides  not  untrippingly  in  writing  of 
lighter  things,  is  never  so  inclined  to  halt  and  sputter 


XX  INTRODUCTION 

as  when  I  try  to  drive  it  to  its  task  of  registering  in 
black  scrawls  on  white  paper  something  of  what  the 
sight  of  a  soaring  mountain  peak,  the  depth  of  a  black 
gorge  with  a  white  stream  roaring  at  the  bottom,  or 
the  morning  mists  rising  from  a  silently  flowing  river 
have  registered  on  the  sensitized  sheets  of  my  memory. 
Superlative  in  grandeur  to  the  last  degree  as  are  the 
mountains,  glaciers,  gorges,  waterfalls,  cascades  and 
cliffs  of  the  Columbia,  it  is  to  my  photographs  rather 
than  my  pen  that  I  trust  to  convey  something  of  their 
real  message. 

If  I  can,  however,  pass  on  to  my  readers  some  sug- 
gestion of  the  keenness  of  my  own  enjoyment  of  what 
I  experienced  on  the  Columbia — of  the  sheer  joie  de 
vivre  that  is  the  lot  of  the  man  who  rides  the  running 
road ;  it  will  have  not  been  in  vain  that  I  have  cramped 
my  fingers  and  bent  my  back  above  a  desk  during 
several  weeks  of  the  best  part  of  the  California  year. 
Robert  Service  has  written  something  about 

"Doing  things  just  for  the  doing. 

Letting  babblers  tell  the  story  .  .  ." 

Shall  I  need  to  confess  to  my  readers  that  the  one 
cloud  on  the  seaward  horizon  during  all  of  my  voyage 
down  the  Columbia  was  brooding  there  as  a  conse- 
quence of  the  presentiment  that,  sooner  or  later,  I 
should  have  to  do  my  own  babbling? 

Pasadena,  July,  1921. 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTER 

Introduction 

I  Preparing  for  the  Big  Bend 

II  Up  Horse  Thief  Creek    . 

III  At  the  Glacier         .... 

IV  The  Lake  of  the  Hanging  Glaciers 
V  Canal  Flats  to  Beavermotith 

VI  Through  Surprise  Rapids 

VII  KiNBASKET  Lake  and  Rapids     . 

VIII  Boat  Encampment  to  Revelstoke 

IX  Revelstoke  to  the  Spokane 

X  Rafting  Through  Hell  Gate 

XI  By  Launch  Through  Box  Canyon 

XII  Chelan  to  Pasco       .         .         .  '      . 

XIII  Pasco  to  the  Dalles 

XIV  The  Home  Stretch 


PAQK 

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286 

323 

360 


ILLUSTRATIONS 


Mt.   Sir   Donald,  which  drains   from  all  sides  to  the   Co- 
lumbia        .......     Frontispiece 

FACING  PAGE 

10 


Mt.  Assiniboine,  near  the  headwaters  of  the  Columbia 
Twin   Falls,   Takakaw   Falls,   two   great   cataracts   of   the 

Columbia  watershed  .... 

The  "turning-in"  scene  shot  in  silhouette 
"Reverse"  of  the  "going-to-bed"  shot   . 
On  the  Horse  Thief  Trail       .... 

A  dead-fall  on  the  trail 

Looking  toward  the  entrance  of  the  ice  cave 

Where  the  Hanging  Glacier  is  about  to  fall  . 

My  shower  bath  in  an  ice  cave 

Warming  up  after  my  glacial  shower  bath    . 

Ross  and  Harmon.     Dragon  moraine  in  distance 

The  horses  in  the  mouth  of  the  ice  cave 

Looking  across  the  Lake  of  the  Hanging  Glaciers 

The   Lake  of  the   Hanging  Glaciers,  taken  from  the  ice 

walls,  looking  north  .... 

The  face  of  the  Hanging  Glacier  . 
Where  my  party  foregathered  with  Harmon's  on 

of  the  Lake  of  the  Hanging  Glacier 

Old  Hudson  Bay  cart  at  Beavermouth   . 
My  first  push-off  at  the  head  of  canoe  navigation  on  the 
Columbia  ...... 

Opening  scene  of  the  "Farmer"  picture 

Old  stern  wheelers  at  Golden 

A  quiet  stretch  of  the  Columbia  near  Golden 

Arrival  of  our  boat  at  Beavermouth 

Our  first  camp  at  Beavermouth 

The  remains  of  a  sunken   forest    . 

Trapper's  cabin  where  we  found  shelter  for  the  night 


the  shore 


11 
38 
38 
39 
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67 

72 

73 
80 

80 
81 
81 
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96 
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ILLUSTRATIONS 


Where  we  landed  above  Surprise  Rapids 
Where  we  tied  up  at  "Eight  mile"  .... 
"Shooting"  the  first  bit  of  lining  at  Surprise  Rapids  . 
The  camp  where  the  roar  of  the  rapids  deafened  us   . 

W^here  Steinhof  was  drowned 

Where  Andy  just  missed  drowning  in  Surprise  Rapids 

Looking  through  the  pines  at  Surprise  Rapids     . 

Head  of  second  fall  of  Surprise  Rapids 

Blackmore  and  the  ling  that  refused  to  "register" 

The  winter,  with  pike-pole  just  before  lining  Death  Rapid 

Andy  and  I  pulling  down  Kinbasket  Lake   . 

Our  wettest  camp,  at  Kinbasket  Lake  .... 

The  old  ferry  tower  above  Canoe  River 

Where  we  tied  up  at  Kinbasket  Lake    .... 

The  bridge  which  the  Columbia  carried  a  hundred  miles  and 

placed  across  another  stream   ..... 
Lining  down  to  the  head  of  Death  Rapids   . 
Trapper's  cabin  being  undermined  by  stream 
The  camp  above  Twelve-Mile         ..... 
Landing  at  sunset  above  Canoe  River   .... 
Andy  and   Blackmore  swinging  the  boat  into  the  head  o 

Rock  Slide  Rapids    ....... 

The  big  rollers,  from  1 5  to  20  feet  from  hollow  to  crest,  at 

head  of  Death  Rapids      ...... 

Looking  across  to  Boat  Encampment     .... 

"Wood  smoke  at  twilight"  above  Twelve-Mile 
Lining  down  Rock  Slide  Rapids    ..... 

When  the  Columbia  took  half  of  my  riding  breeches  . 
Bonnington  Falls  of  the  Kootenay         .... 

Plastered  log  cabin  in  the  Doukhobor  village 

Trucking  the  skiif  througli  Kettle  Falls 

Twilight  in  the  gorge  at  Kettle  Falls   .... 

Waiting  for  the  fog  to  lift  above  Bishop's  Rapids 

Ross  and  Armstrong  registering  "gloom" 

The  "intake"  at  the  Little  Dalles   ..... 

W^here  we  started  to  line  the  Little  Dalles   . 

Map  of  the  Upper  Columbia 


FACINQ  FAOE 

97 


ILLUSTRATIONS 


Mc 


A  "close-up"  of  Ike  building  his  raft  . 

My  fifty  pound  salmon 

Ike  riding  a  log 

Ike  on  the  mooring  line  of  the  raft 

Raft  in  tow  of  launch  near  mouth  of  San  Foil 

Ike  at  the  sweep  below  Hell  Gate 

The  suspension  bridge  at  Chelan  Falls  . 

Old  River  veterans  on  the  landing  at  Potaris.     (Capt 

Dermid  on  left,  Ike  Emerson  on  right) 
Night  was  falling  as  we  headed  into  Box  Canyon 
The  Columbia  above  Box  Canyon  .... 
A  rocky  cliff  near  head  of  Lake  Chelan 
Rainbow  Falls,  350  feet  high,  above  head  of  Lake  Chelan 
Wenatchee  under  the  dust  cloud  of  its  speeding  autos 
Head  of  Rock  Island  Rapids  . 
The  picture  that  cost  me  a  wetting 
The  wreck  of  the  "Douglas"  . 
We  cooked  our  breakfast  in  the  galley 

"Douglas"  .... 

A  rocky  cliff  above  Beverly 
Lifted  drawbridge  on  Celilo  Canal 
Tumwater  Gorge  of  the  Grand  Dalles 
"Imshallah"  in  the  lock  at  Five-Mile 
"Imshallah"  half  way  through  the  Celilo  Canal 
Palisade  Rock,  lower  Columbia  River   . 
Multnomah  Falls,  Columbia  River  Highway,  near  Portland 
City  of  Portland  with  Mt.  Hood  in  the  distance  . 
Bridge  on  Columbia  Highway  near  Portland,  Oregon 


FACING  PAGE 

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256 
257 
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of  the  wreck  of  the 


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363 
370 
371 


DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 


DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 


CHAPTER  I 

PREPARING    FOR    THE    BIG    BEND 

The  itinerary  of  our  Columbia  trip  as  originally 
planned  in  Los  Angeles  called,  first,  for  an  expedi- 
tion to  the  source  of  the  river,  next,  a  voyage  by  boat 
around  the  Big  Bend  from  Beavermouth  to  Revel- 
stoke,  and,  finally,  if  there  was  time  and  good  weather 
held,  a  voyage  of  indefinite  length  on  toward  the  sea. 
As  the  trip  to  the  glaciers  was  largely  a  matter  of 
engaging  a  good  packer  well  in  advance,  while  there 
was  no  certainty  of  getting  any  one  who  would  under- 
take the  passage  of  the  Big  Bend,  it  was  to  the  latter 
that  we  first  directed  our  attention.  Chester  wired  the 
Publicity  Department  of  the  Canadian  Pacific  and  I 
wrote  friends  in  various  parts  of  British  Columbia. 
The  C.  P.  R.  replied  that  they  had  requested  their 
Sub-Divisional  Superintendent  at  Revelstoke  to  in- 
stitute inquiries  for  boatmen  in  our  behalf.  The  only 
one  of  my  friends  who  contributed  anything  tangible 
stated  that  "while  the  Columbia  above  Golden  and 
below  Revelstoke  was  admirably  suited  to  pleasure 
boating,  any  attempt  to  run  the  Big  Bend  between 
those  points  would  result  in  almost  certain  disaster." 

As  this  appeared  to  be  about  the  extent  of  what  we 


2  DOWN  THE  COLU^NIBIA 

were  likely  to  learn  from  a  distance,  I  decided  to 
start  north  at  once  to  see  what  could  be  arranged  on 
the  ground.  Victoria  yielded  little  save  some  large 
scale  maps,  and  even  these,  they  assured  me  in  the 
Geographic  Department  of  the  B.  C.  Government 
where  I  secured  them,  were  very  inaccurate  as  to 
detail.  The  Big  Bend  region,  it  appeared,  had  never 
been  surveyed  north  of  the  comparatively  narrow  zone 
of  the  C.  P.  R.  grant.  Several  old  hunting  friends 
whom  I  met  at  tlie  Club,  although  they  had  ranged  the 
wildernesses  of  the  Northwest  from  the  Barren  Lands 
to  Alaska,  spoke  of  the  Big  Bend  as  a  veritable  terra 
incognita. 

"It's  said  to  be  a  great  country  for  grizzly,"  one 
of  them  volunteered,  "but  too  hard  to  get  at.  Only 
way  to  get  in  and  out  is  the  Columbia,  and  that  is 
more  likely  to  land  you  in  Kingdom  Come  than  back 
in  Civilization.  Best  forget  about  the  Big  Bend  and 
go  after  sheep  and  goat  and  moose  in  the  Kootenays." 

At  Kamloops  I  was  told  of  an  Indian  wlio  had  gone 
round  the  Big  Bend  the  previous  ]May,  before  the 
Spring  rise,  and  come  out  not  only  with  his  own  skin, 
but  with  those  of  seven  grizzlies.  I  was  unable  to 
locate  the  Indian,  but  did  find  a  white  man  who  had 
made  the  trip  with  him.  This  chap  spent  half  an  hour 
apparently  endeavouring  to  persuade  me  to  give  up 
the  trip  on  account  of  the  prohibitive  risk  (my  expe- 
rience on  other  rivers,  he  declared,  would  be  worse 
than  useless  in  such  water  as  was  to  be  encountered  at 
Surprise,  Kinbasket  and  Death  Rapids)  and  about 
an  equal  amount  of  time  trying  to  convince  me  that 
my  life  would  be  perfectly  safe  if  only  I  would  en- 


PREPARING  FOR  THE  BIG  BEND       3 

gage  him  and  his  Indian  and  confide  it  to  their  care. 
As  the  consideration  suggested  in  return  for  this  im- 
munity figured  out  at  between  two  and  three  times 
the  rate  we  had  been  expecting  to  pay  for  boatmen, 
I  had  to  dechne  to  take  advantage  of  it. 

Finally,  in  Revelstoke,  through  the  efforts  of  T.  C. 
McNab  of  the  Canadian  Pacific,  who  had  been  at  con- 
siderable trouble  to  line  up  possible  candidates  for  a 
Big  Bend  trip,  I  met  Bob  Blackmore.  After  that 
things  began  moving  toward  a  definite  end. 

"You  won't  find  old  Bob  Blackmore  an  active 
church-worker,"  I  was  told  in  Revelstoke,  "and  at 
one  time  he  had  the  reputation  of  being  the  smooth- 
est thing  in  the  way  of  a  boot-legger  in  this  part  of 
B.C.  But  he  drinks  little  himself,  is  a  past-master  of 
woodcraft,  a  dead  shot,  and  has  twice  the  experience 
of  swift-water  boating  of  any  man  on  the  upper  Co- 
lumbia. In  spite  of  the  fact  that  he  has  undergone 
no  end  of  hardship  in  his  thirty  years  of  packing, 
hunting,  prospecting,  trapping  and  boating  all  over 
the  West,  he's  as  hard  to-daj^  at  fifty  odd  as  most  men 
are  at  thirty.  Because  he  dished  a  boatload  of  freight 
last  year  somewhere  up  river,  there  are  a  few  who  are 
saying  that  old  Bob  Blackmore  is  losing  his  grip. 
Don't  believe  it.  He  was  never  better  in  his  life  than 
he  is  right  now,  and  if  you  can  persuade  him  to  run 
your  show  round  the  Big  Bend  you're  in  luck.  Once 
you  start,  you'll  come  right  on  round  to  Revelstoke  all 
right.  No  fear  on  that  score.  But  if  you  have  old 
Bob  Blackmore  you'll  stand  a  jolly  lot  better  chance 
of  arriving  on  top  of  the  water." 

I  found  Bob  Blackmore  at  his  river-side  home  in  the 


4  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

old  town — what  had  been  the  metropolitan  centre  of 
Revelstoke  in  the  days  when  it  was  the  head  of  naviga- 
tion of  steamers  from  below  the  Arrow  Lakes,  and 
before  the  railway  had  come  to  drag  settlement  a 
mile  northeastward  and  away  from  the  Columbia. 
He  was  picking  apples  with  one  hand  and  slapping 
mosquitoes  with  the  other — a  grey-haired,  grey-eyed 
man  of  middle  height,  with  a  muscular  torso,  a  steady 
stare,  and  a  grip  that  I  had  to  meet  half  way  to  save 
my  fingers.  He  might  have  passed  for  a  well-to-do 
Middle  Western  farmer  except  for  his  iron-grey 
moustaches,  which  were  long  and  drooping,  like  those 
affected  by  cowboy-town  sheriffs  in  the  movies. 

I  knew  at  once  that  this  was  the  man  I  wanted,  and 
my  only  doubt  was  as  to  whether  or  not  he  felt  the 
same  way  about  me.  They  had  told  me  in  town  that 
Blackmore,  having  some  means  and  being  more  or  less 
independent,  never  went  out  with  a  man  or  an  outfit 
he  did  not  like.  I  felt  that  it  was  I  who  was  on  ap- 
proval, not  he.  I  need  not  have  worried,  however.  In 
this  instance,  at  least,  Bob  Blackmore's  mind  was 
made  up  in  advance.  It  was  the  movies  that  had 
done  it. 

"The  C.  P.  R.  people  wi'ote  me  that  you  might  be 
wanting  me  for  the  Bend,"  he  said  genially  after  I 
had  introduced  myself,  "and  on  the  chance  that  we 
would  be  hitching  up  I  have  put  my  big  boat  in  the 
water  to  give  her  a  good  soaking.  I've  figured  that 
she's  the  only  boat  on  the  upper  river  that  will  do  for 
what  you  want.  I  reckon  I  know  them  all.  She'll 
carry  three  or  four  times  as  much  as  the  biggest  Peter- 
boro.     Besides,  if  you  tried  to  go  round  in  canoes. 


PREPARING  FOR  THE  BIG  BEND      5 

you'd  be  portaging  or  lining  in  a  dozen  places  where 
I  would  drive  this  one  straight  through.  With  any 
luck,  and  if  the  water  doesn't  go  down  too  fast,  I'd 
figure  on  going  the  whole  way  without  taking  her  out 
of  the  river  at  more'n  one  place,  and  maybe  not  there." 

"So  you're  willing  to  go  ahead  and  see  us  through," 
I  exclaimed  delightedly.  "They  told  me  in  the  town 
that  you'd  probably  need  a  lot  of  persuading,  espe- 
cially as  you've  been  saying  for  the  last  two  or  three 
years  that  you  were  through  with  the  Bend  for  good 
and  aU." 

Blackmore  grinned  broadly  and  somewhat  sheep- 
ishly. "So  I  have,"  he  said.  "Fact  is,  I've  never  yet 
been  round  the  Bend  that  I  didn't  tell  myself  and 
everybody  else  that  I'd  never  try  it  again.  I  really 
meant  it  the  last  time,  which  was  three  or  four  years 
ago.  And  I've  really  meant  it  every  time  I  said  it 
right  up  to  a  few  days  back,  when  I  heard  that  you 
wanted  to  take  a  movie  machine  in  there  and  try  and 
get  some  pictures.  If  that  was  so,  I  said  to  myself, 
it  was  sure  up  to  me  to  do  what  I  could  to  help,  for 
there's  scenery  in  there  that  is  more  worth  picturing 
than  any  I've  come  across  in  thirty  years  of  knocking 
around  all  over  the  mountain  country  of  the  West. 
So  I'm  your  man  if  you  want  me.  Of  course  you 
know  something  of  what  you're  going  up  against  in 
bucking  the  Bend?" 

"Yes,"  I  replied  a  bit  wearily.  "I've  been  hearing 
very  little  else  for  the  last  week.  Let's  talk  about  the 
scenery." 

"So  they've  been  trying  to  frighten  you  out  of  it," 
he  said  with  a  sympathetic  smile.     "They  always  do 


6  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

that  with  strangers  who  come  here  to  tackle  the  Bend. 
And  mostly  they  succeed.  There  was  one  chap  they 
couldn't  stop,  though.  He  was  a  professor  of  some 
kind  from  Philadelphia.  Fact  is,  he  wasn't  enough 
frightened.  That's  a  bad  thing  with  the  Columbia, 
which  isn't  to  be  taken  liberties  with.  I  buried  him 
near  the  head  of  Kinbasket  Lake.  We'll  see  his  grave 
when  we  come  down  from  Surprise  Rapids.  I'll  want 
to  stop  off  for  a  bit  and  see  if  the  cross  I  put  up  is  still 
standing.    He  was  .  .  ." 

''Et  tu Brute"  I  muttered  under  my  breath.  Then, 
aloud:    "Let's  look  at  the  boat." 

Already  this  penchant  of  the  natives  for  turning  the 
pages  of  the  Big  Bend's  gruesome  record  of  death  and 
disaster  was  getting  onto  my  nerves,  and  it  was  rather 
a  shock  to  find  even  the  quiet-spoken,  steady-eyed 
Blackmore  addicted  to  the  habit.  Afterwards,  when 
I  got  used  to  it,  I  ceased  to  mind.  As  a  matter  of 
fact,  the  good  souls  could  no  more  help  expatiating 
on  what  the  Big  Bend  had  done  to  people  who  had 
taken  liberties  with  it  than  an  aviator  who  is  about  to 
take  you  for  a  flight  can  help  leading  you  round  back 
of  the  hangar  and  showing  you  the  wreckage  of  his 
latest  crash.  It  seems  to  be  one  of  the  inevitable 
promptings  of  the  human  animal  to  warn  his  brother 
animal  of  troubles  ahead.  This  is  doubtless  the  out- 
growth of  the  bogies  and  the  "don'ts"  which  are  cal- 
culated to  check  the  child's  explorative  and  investiga- 
tive instincts  in  his  nursery  days.  From  the  source  to 
the  mouth  of  the  Columbia  it  was  never  (according  to 
the  solicitous  volunteer  advisers  along  the  way)  the 
really  dangerous  rapids  that  I  had  put  behind  me. 


PREPARING  FOR  THE  BIG  BEND       7 

These  were  always  somewhere  ahead — usually  just 
around  the  next  bend,  where  I  would  run  into  them 
the  first  thing  in  the  morning.  Luckily,  I  learned  to 
discount  these  warnings  very  early  in  the  game,  and 
so  saved  much  sleep  which  it  would  have  been  a  real 
loss  to  be  deprived  of. 

Blackmore  led  the  way  back  through  his  apple 
orchard  and  down  a  stairway  that  descended  the 
steeply-sloping  river  bank  to  his  boat-house.  The 
Columbia,  a  quarter  of  a  mile  wide  and  with  just  a 
shade  of  grey  clouding  its  lucent  greenness  to  reveal 
its  glacial  origin,  slid  swiftly  but  smoothly  by  with  a 
purposeful  current  of  six  or  seven  miles  an  hour.  A 
wing-dam  of  concrete,  evidently  built  to  protect  the 
works  of  a  sawmill  a  bit  farther  down  stream,  jutted 
out  into  the  current  just  above,  and  the  boat-house,  set 
on  a  raft  of  huge  logs,  floated  in  the  eddy  below. 

There  were  two  boats  in  sight,  both  in  the  water. 
Blackmore  indicated  the  larger  one  of  the  pair — a 
double-ender  of  about  thirty  feet  in  length  and  gen- 
erous beam — as  the  craft  recommended  for  the  Big 
Bend  trip.  "I  built  her  for  the  Bend  more  than  fif- 
teen years  ago,"  he  said,  tapping  the  heavy  gunwale 
with  the  toe  of  his  boot.  "She's  the  only  boat  I  know 
that  has  been  all  the  way  round  more  than  once,  so 
you  might  say  she  knows  the  road.  She's  had  many  a 
hard  bump,  but — with  any  luck — she  ought  to  stand 
one  or  two  more.  Not  that  I'm  asking  for  any  more 
than  can  be  helped,  though.  There's  no  boat  ever 
built  that  will  stand  a  head-on  crash  'gainst  a  rock  in 
any  such  current  as  is  driving  it  down  Surprise  or 
Kinbasket  or  Death  Rapids,  or  a  dozen  other  runs  of 


8  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

swift  water  on  the  Bend.  Of  course,  you're  going  to 
hit  once  in  a  while,  spite  of  all  you  can  do;  but,  if 
you're  lucky,  you'll  probably  kiss  off  without  stav- 
ing in  a  side.  If  you're  not — well,  if  you're  not 
lucky,  you  have  no  business  fooling  with  the  Bend 
at  all. 

"Now  what  I  like  about  this  big  boat  of  mine,"  he 
continued,  taking  up  the  scope  of  the  painter  to  bring 
her  in  out  of  the  tug  of  the  current,  "is  that  she's  a 
lucky  boat.  Never  lost  a  man  out  of  her — that  is, 
directly — and  only  one  load  of  freight.  Now  with 
that  one  (indicating  the  smaller  craft,  a  canoe-like 
double-ender  of  about  twenty  feet)  it's  just  the  other 
way.  If  there's  trouble  around  she'll  have  her  nose 
into  it.  She's  as  good  a  built  boat  as  any  on  the  river, 
easy  to  handle  up  stream  and  down — but  unlucky. 
Why,  only  a  few  weeks  ago  a  lad  from  the  town  bor- 
rowed her  to  have  a  bit  of  a  lark  running  the  ripple 
over  that  dam  there.  It's  covered  at  high  water,  and 
just  enough  of  a  pitch  to  give  the  youngsters  a  little 
excitement  in  dropping  over.  Safe  enough  stunt  with 
any  luck  at  all.  But  that  boat's  not  lucky.  She 
drifted  on  sidewise,  caught  her  keel  and  capsized.  The 
lad  and  the  two  girls  with  him  were  all  drowned.  They 
found  his  body  a  week  or  two  later.  All  his  pockets 
were  turned  wrong-side-out  and  empty.  The  Colum- 
bia current  most  always  plays  that  trick  on  a  man — 
picks  his  pockets  clean.  The  bodies  of  the  girls  never 
did  show  up.  Probably  the  sand  got  into  their  clothes 
and  held  them  down.  That's  another  little  trick  of 
the  Columbia.  She's  as  full  of  tricks  as  a  box  of 
monkeys,  that  old  stream  there,  and  you've  got  to 


PREPARING  FOR  THE  BIG  BEND       9 

keep  an  eye  lifting  for  'em  all  the  time  if  you're  going 
to  steer  clear  of  trouble." 

"It  won't  be  the  first  time  I've  had  my  pockets 
picked,"  I  broke  in  somewhat  testily.  "Besides,  if 
you're  going  to  charge  me  at  the  rate  that  Indian  I 
heard  of  in  Kamloops  demanded,  there  won't  be  any- 
thing left  for  the  Columbia  to  extract." 

That  brought  us  down  to  business,  and  I  had  no 
complaint  to  make  of  the  terms  Blackmore  suggested 
— twelve  dollars  a  day  for  himself  and  boat,  I  to  buy 
the  provisions  and  make  my  own  arrangements  with 
any  additional  boatmen.  I  already  had  sensed 
enough  of  the  character  of  the  work  ahead  to  know 
that  a  good  boatman  would  be  cheap  at  any  price,  and 
a  poor  one  dear  if  working  only  for  his  grub.  Black- 
more  was  to  get  the  big  boat  in  shape  and  have  it 
ready  to  ship  by  rail  to  Beavermouth  (at  the  head  of 
the  Bend  and  the  most  convenient  point  to  get  a  craft 
into  the  river)  when  I  returned  from  the  source  of  the 
Columbia  above  Windermere. 

Going  on  to  Golden  by  train  from  Revelstoke,  I 
looked  up  Captain  F.  P.  Armstrong,  with  whom  I  had 
already  been  in  communication  by  wire.  The  Captain 
had  navigated  steamers  between  Golden  and  Winder- 
mere for  many  years,  they  told  me  at  C.  P.  R.  head- 
quarters in  Revelstoke,  and  had  also  some  experience 
of  the  Bend.  He  would  be  unable  to  join  me  for  the 
trip  himself,  but  had  spoken  to  one  or  two  men  who 
might  be  induced  to  do  so.  In  any  event  his  advice 
would  be  invaluable. 

I  shall  have  so  much  to  say  of  Captain  Armstrong 
in  the  account  of  a  later  part  of  my  down-river  voy- 


10  DOWN  THE  COLU]MBIA 

age  that  the  briefest  introduction  to  a  man  who  has 
been  one  of  the  most  picturesque  personalities  in  the 
pioneering  history  of  British  Columbia  will  suffice 
here.  Short,  compactly  but  cleanly  built,  with  iron- 
grey  hair,  square,  determined  jaw  and  piercing  black 
eyes,  he  has  been  well  characterized  as  "the  biggest 
little  man  on  the  upper  Columbia."  Although  he 
confessed  to  sixty-three  years,  he  might  well  have 
passed  for  fifty,  a  circumstance  which  doubtless  had 
much  to  do  with  the  fact  that  he  saw  three  years  of 
active  service  in  the  transport  service  on  the  Tigris 
and  Nile  during  the  late  war.  Indeed,  as  became  ap- 
parent later,  he  generally  had  as  much  reserve  energy 
at  the  end  of  a  long  day's  paddling  as  another  man 
I  could  mention  who  is  rather  loath  to  admit 
forty. 

Captain  Armstrong  explained  that  he  was  about  to 
close  the  sale  of  one  of  his  mines  on  a  tributary  of  the 
upper  Columbia,  and  for  that  reason  would  be  unable 
to  join  us  for  the  Big  Bend  trip,  as  much  as  he  would 
have  enjoyed  doing  so.  In  the  event  that  I  decided 
to  continue  on  down  the  Columbia  after  circling  the 
Bend,  it  was  just  possible  he  would  be  clear  to  go 
along  for  a  way.  He  spoke  highly  of  Blackmore's 
ability  as  a  river  man,  and  mentioned  one  or  two  others 
in  Golden  whom  he  thought  might  be  secured.  Ten 
dollars  a  day  was  the  customary  pay  for  a  boatman 
going  all  the  way  round  the  Bend.  That  was  about 
twice  the  ordinary  wage  prevailing  at  the  time  in  the 
sawmills  and  lumber  camps.  The  extra  five  was 
partly  insurance,  and  partly  because  the  work  was 
hard  and  really  good  river  men  very  scarce.    It  was 


.'■Ur  /"' 


I'j^ 


^a-^. 


\ 


Courtesy  of  Byron  Harmon,  Banff 
MT,  ASSINIBOINE,   NEAR  THE  HEADWATERS  OF  THE  COLUMBIA 


PREPARING  FOR  THE  BIG  BEND     11 

fair  pay  for  an  experienced  hand.  A  poor  boatman 
was  worse  than  none  at  all,  that  is,  in  a  pinch,  while  a 
good  one  might  easily  mean  the  difference  between 
success  and  disaster.  And  of  course  I  knew  that  dis- 
aster on  the  Bend — with  perhaps  fifty  miles  of  track- 
less mountains  between  a  wet  man  on  the  bank  and 
the  nearest  human  habitation — was  spelt  with  a 
big  D. 

So  far  as  I  can  remember,  Captain  Armstrong  was 
the  only  one  with  whom  I  talked  in  Golden  who  did 
not  try  to  dramatize  the  dangers  and  difficulties  of  the 
Big  Bend.  Seemingly  taking  it  for  granted  that  I 
knew  all  about  them,  or  in  any  case  would  hear  enough 
of  them  from  the  others,  he  turned  his  attention  to 
forwarding  practical  plans  for  the  trip.  He  even 
contributed  a  touch  of  romance  to  a  venture  that  the 
rest  seemed  a  unit  in  trying  to  make  me  believe  was  a 
sort  of  a  cross  between  going  over  Niagara  in  barrel 
and  a  flight  to  one  of  the  Poles. 

"There  was  a  deal  of  boot-legging  on  the  river  be- 
tween Golden  and  Boat  Encampment  during  the 
years  the  Grand  Trunk  was  being  built,"  he  said  as 
we  pored  over  an  outspread  map  of  the  Big  Bend, 
"for  that  was  the  first  leg  of  the  run  into  the  western 
construction  camps,  where  the  sale  of  liquor  was  for- 
bidden by  law.  Many  and  many  a  boatload  of  the 
stuff  went  wrong  in  the  rapids.  This  would  have  been 
inevitable  in  any  case,  just  in  the  ordinary  course  of 
working  in  such  difficult  water.  But  what  made  the 
losses  worse  was  the  fact  that  a  good  many  of  the  boot- 
leggers always  started  off  with  a  load  under  their  belts 
as  well  as  in  their  boats.    Few  of  the  bodies  were  ever 


12  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

found,  but  with  the  casks  of  whisky  it  was  different, 
doubtless  because  the  latter  would  float  longer  and 
resist  buffeting  better.  Cask  after  cask  has  kept 
turning  up  through  the  years,  even  down  to  the  pres- 
ent, when  B.  C.  is  a  comparative  desert.  They  are 
found  in  the  most  unexpected  places,  and  it's  very 
rare  for  a  party  to  go  all  the  way  round  the  Bend 
without  stumbling  onto  one.  So  bear  well  in  mind  you 
are  not  to  go  by  anything  that  looks  like  a  small  bar- 
rel without  looking  to  see  if  it  has  a  head  in  both  ends. 
If  you  have  time,  it  will  pay  you  to  clamber  for  a  few 
hours  over  the  great  patch  of  drift  just  below  INIiddle 
River  on  Kinbasket  Lake.  That's  the  one  great  catch- 
all for  everything  floatable  that  gets  into  the  river 
below  Golden.  I've  found  just  about  everything  there 
from  a  canary  bird  cage  to  a  railway  bridge.  Failing 
there  (which  will  only  be  because  you  don't  search 
long  enough),  dig  sixteen  paces  northwest  by  com- 
pass from  the  foundation  of  the  west  tower  of  the 
abandoned  cable  ferry  just  above  Boat  Encamp- 
ment." 

"How's  that  again!"  I  exclaimed  incredulously. 
"Sure  you  aren't  confusing  the  Big  Bend  with  the 
Spanish  Main?" 

"If  you  follow  my  directions,"  replied  the  Captain 
with  a  grin,  "you'll  uncover  more  treasure  for  five 
minutes'  scratching  than  you'd  be  likely  to  find  in 
turning  over  the  Dry  Tortugas  for  five  years.  You 
see,  it  was  this  way,"  he  went  on,  smiling  the  smile  of 
a  man  who  speaks  of  something  which  has  strongly 
stirred  his  imagination.  "It  was  only  a  few  weeks 
after  Walter  Steinhoff  was  lost  in  Sm-prise  Rapids 


PREPARING  FOR  THE  BIG  BEND     13 

that  I  made  the  trip  round  the  Bend  in  a  Peterboro  to 
examine  some  silver-lead  prospects  I  had  word  of.  I 
had  with  me  Pete  Bergenham  (a  first-class  river  man; 
one  you  will  do  well  to  get  yourself  if  you  can)  and 
another  chap.  This  fellow  was  good  enough  with  the 
paddle,  but — though  I  didn't  know  it  when  I  engaged 
him — badly  addicted  to  drink.  That's  a  fatal  weak- 
ness for  a  man  who  is  going  to  work  in  swift  water, 
and  especially  such  water  as  you  strike  at  Surprise 
and  the  long  run  of  Kinbasket  Rapids.  The  wreck- 
age of  Steinhoff' s  disaster  (Blackmore  will  spin  you 
the  straightest  yarn  about  that)  was  scattered  all  the 
way  from  the  big  whirlpool  in  Surprise  Rapids  down 
to  Middle  River,  where  they  finally  found  his  body. 
We  might  easily  have  picked  up  more  than  the  one 
ten-gallon  cask  we  bumped  into,  floating  just  sub- 
merged, in  the  shallows  of  the  mud  island  at  the  head 
of  Kinbasket  Lake. 

"I  didn't  feel  quite  right  about  having  so  much 
whisky  along ;  but  the  stuff  had  its  value  even  in  those 
days,  and  I  would  have  felt  still  worse  about  leaving 
it  to  fall  into  the  hands  of  some  one  who  would  be 
less  moderate  in  its  use  than  would  I.  I  knew  Pete 
Bergenham  was  all  right,  and  counted  on  being  able 
to  keep  an  eye  on  the  other  man.  That  was  just 
where  I  fell  down.  I  should  have  taken  the  cask  to 
bed  with  me  instead  of  leaving  it  in  the  canoe. 

"When  the  fellow  got  to  the  whisky  I  never  knew, 
but  it  was  probably  well  along  toward  morning.  He 
was  already  up  when  I  awoke,  and  displayed  un- 
wonted energy  in  getting  breakfast  and  breaking 
camp.    If  I  had  known  how  heavily  he  had  been  tip- 


U  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

pling  I  would  have  given  him  another  drink  before 
pushing  off  to  steady  his  nerve.  That  might  have  held 
him  all  right.  As  it  was,  reaction  in  mind  and  body- 
set  in  just  as  we  headed  into  that  first  sharp  dip  be- 
low the  lake — the  beginning  of  the  twenty-one  miles 
of  Kinbasket  Rapids.  At  the  place  where  the  bot- 
tom has  dropped  out  from  under  and  left  the  chan- 
nel blocked  by  jagged  rocks  with  no  place  to  run 
through,  he  collapsed  as  if  kicked  in  the  stomach,  and 
slithered  down  into  the  bottom  of  the  canoe,  blubber- 
ing like  a  baby.  We  just  did  manage  to  make  our 
landing  above  the  cascade.  With  a  less  skilful  man 
than  Bergenham  at  the  stern  paddle  we  would  have 
failed,  and  that  would  have  meant  that  we  should 
probably  not  have  stopped  for  good  before  we  settled 
into  the  mud  at  the  bottom  of  the  Arrow  Lakes. 

"Even  after  that  I  could  not  find  it  in  my  heart  to 
dish  for  good  and  all  so  much  prime  whisky.  So  I 
compromised  by  burying  it  that  night,  after  we  had 
come  through  the  rapids  without  further  mishap,  at 
the  spot  I  have  told  you  of.  That  it  was  the  best  thing 
to  do  under  the  circumstances  I  am  quite  convinced. 
The  mere  thought  that  it  was  still  in  the  world  has 
cheered  me  in  many  a  thirsty  interval — yes,  even 
out  on  the  Tigris  and  the  Nile,  when  there  was  no  cer- 
tainty I  would  ever  come  back  to  get  it  again. 

"And  now  I'm  going  to  tell  you  how  to  find  it,  for 
there's  no  knowing  if  I  shall  ever  have  a  chance  to  go 
for  it  myself.  If  you  bring  it  out  to  Revelstoke  safely, 
we'll  split  it  fifty-fifty,  as  thej^  say  on  your  side  of  the 
line.  All  I  shall  want  to  know  is  who  your  other  boat- 
men are  going  to  be.    Blackmore  is  all  right,  but  if 


PREPARING  FOR  THE  BIG  BEND     15 

any  one  of  the  men  whom  he  takes  with  him  is  a  real 
drinker,  you'd  best  forget  the  whole  thing.  If  it's  an 
'all-sober '  crew,  I'll  give  you  a  map,  marked  so  plainly 
that  you  can't  go  wrong.  It  will  be  a  grand  haul,  for 
it  was  Number  One  Scotch  even  when  we  planted  it 
there,  and  since  then  it  has  been  ageing  in  wood  for 
something  like  ten  years.  I  suppose  you'll  be  keen  to 
smuggle  your  dividend  right  on  down  into  the  'The 
Great  American  Desert'?"  he  concluded  with  a  grin. 

"Trust  me  for  that,"  I  replied  with  a  knowing  shake 
of  my  head.  "I  didn't  spend  six  months  writing  up 
opium  smuggling  on  the  China  Coast  for  nothing.'* 
Then  I  told  him  the  story  of  the  Eurasian  lady  who 
was  fat  in  Amoy  and  thin  in  Hongkong,  and  who 
finally  confessed  to  having  smuggled  forty  pounds  of 
opium,  three  times  a  week  for  five  years,  in  oiled  silk 
hip-  and  bust-pads. 

"You  must  have  a  lot  of  prime  ideas,"  said  the 
Captain  admiringly.  "You  ought  to  make  it  easy, 
especially  if  you  cross  the  line  by  boat.  How  would  a 
false  bottom  .  .  .  but  perhaps  it  would  be  safer  to 
float  it  down  submerged,  with  an  old  shingle-bolt  for 
a  buoy,  and  pick  it  up  afterwards." 

"Or  inside  my  pneumatic  mattress,"  I  suggested. 
"But  perhaps  it  would  taste  from  the  rubber."  By 
midnight  we  had  evolved  a  plan  which  could  not  fail, 
and  which  was  almost  without  risk.  "The  stuff's  as 
good  as  in  California,"  I  told  myself  before  I  went  to 
sleep — "and  enough  to  pay  all  the  expenses  of  my  trip 
in  case  I  should  care  to  boot-leg  it,  which  I  won't." 

Captain  Armstrong's  mention  of  the  Steinhoff  dis- 
aster was  not  the  first  I  had  heard  of  it.    The  chap 


16  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

with  whom  I  hud  talked  in  Kamloops  had  shown  me  a 
photograph  of  a  rude  cross  that  he  and  his  Indian 
companion  had  erected  over  Steinhoff's  grave,  and  in 
Revelstoke  nearly  every  one  who  spoke  of  the  Bend 
made  some  reference  to  the  tragic  affair.  But  here  in 
Golden,  which  had  heen  his  home,  the  spectacularity  of 
his  passing  seemed  to  have  had  an  even  more  profound 
effect.  As  with  everything  else  connected  with  the 
Big  Bend,  however,  there  was  a  very  evident  tend- 
ency to  dramatize,  to  "play  up,"  the  incident.  I 
heard  many  different  versions  of  the  story,  but  there 
was  one  part,  the  tragic  finale,  in  which  they  all  were 
in  practical  agreement.  When  his  canoe  broke  loose 
from  its  line,  they  said,  and  shot  down  toward  the  big 
whirlpool  at  the  foot  of  the  second  cataract  of  Sur- 
prise Bapids,  Steinhoff,  realizing  that  there  was  no 
chance  of  the  light  craft  surviving  the  maelstrom, 
coolly  turned  round,  waved  farewell  to  his  companions 
on  the  bank,  and,  folding  his  arms,  went  down  to  his 
death.  Canoe  and  man  were  sucked  completely  out 
of  sight,  never  to  be  seen  again  until  the  fragments 
of  the  one  and  the  battered  body  of  the  other  were 
cast  up,  weeks  later,  many  miles  below. 

It  was  an  extremely  effective  stoiy,  especially  as 
told  by  the  local  member  in  the  B.  C.  Provincial  As- 
sembly, who  had  real  histrionic  talent.  But  somehow 
I  couldn't  quite  reconcile  the  Nirvanic  resignation 
implied  by  the  farewell  wave  and  the  folded  arms  with 
the  never-say-die,  cat-with-nine-lives  spirit  I  had 
come  to  associate  with  your  true  swift-water  boatman 
the  world  over.  I  was  quite  ready  to  grant  that  the 
big  sockdolager  of  a  whirlpool  below  the  second  pitch 


PREPARING  FOR  THE  BIG  BEND     17 

of  Surprise  Rapids  was  a  real  all-day  and  all-night 
sucker,  but  the  old  river  hand  who  gave  up  to  it  like 
the  Kentucky  coons  at  the  sight  of  Davy  Crockett's 
squirrel-gun  wasn't  quite  convincing.  That,  and  the 
iterated  statement  that  Steinhoff' s  canoe-mate,  who 
was  thrown  into  the  water  at  the  same  time,  won  his 
way  to  the  bank  by  walking  along  the  bottom  beneath 
the  surface,  had  a  decidedly  steadying  effect  on  the 
erratic  flights  to  which  my  fancy  had  been  launched 
by  Big  Bend  yarns  generally.  There  had  been  some- 
thing strangely  familiar  in  them  all,  and  finally  it 
came  to  me — Chinese  feng-shui  generally,  and  par- 
ticularly the  legends  of  the  sampan  men  of  the  portage 
villages  along  the  Ichang  gorges  of  the  Yangtze. 
The  things  the  giant  dragon  lurking  in  the  whirlpools 
at  the  foot  of  the  rapids  would  do  to  the  luckless  ones 
he  got  his  back-curving  teeth  into  were  just  a  slightly 
different  way  of  telling  what  the  good  folk  of  Golden 
claimed  the  Big  Bend  would  do  to  the  hapless  wights 
who  ventured  down  its  darksome  depths. 

Now  that  I  thought  of  it  in  this  clarifying  light, 
there  had  been  "dragon  stuff"  bobbing  up  about  al- 
most every  stretch  of  rough  water  I  had  boated. 
Mostly  it  was  native  superstition,  but  partly  it  was 
small  town  pride — pride  in  the  things  their  "Dragon" 
had  done,  and  would  do.  Human  nature — yes,  and 
river  rapids,  too — are  very  much  the  same  the  world 
over,  whether  on  the  Yangtze,  Brahmaputra  or  upper 
Columbia. 

That  brought  the  Big  Bend  into  its  proper  per- 
spective. I  realized  that  it  was  only  water  running 
down  hill  after  all.    Possibly  it  was  faster  than  any- 


18  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

thing  I  had  boated  previously,  and  certainly — except- 
ing the  Yukon  perhaps — colder.  A  great  many  men 
had  been  drowned  in  trying  to  run  it ;  but  so  had  men 
been  drowned  in  duck-ponds.  But  many  men  had 
gone  round  without  disaster,  and  that  would  I  do, 
Imshallah.  I  always  liked  that  pious  Arab  qualifi- 
cation when  speaking  of  futurities.  Later  I  applied 
the  name — in  fancy — to  the  skiff  in  which  I  made  the 
voyage  down  the  lower  river. 

Yes,  undoubtedly  the  most  of  the  yarns  and  the 
warnings  were  "dragon  stuff"  pure  and  simple,  but 
Romance  remained.  A  hundred  miles  of  river  with 
possible  treasure  lurking  in  every  eddy,  and  one  place 
where  it  had  to  be!  I  felt  as  I  did  the  first  time  I 
read  "Treasure  Island,"  only  more  so.  For  that  I 
had  only  read,  and  now  I  was  going  to  search  for  my- 
self— yes,  and  I  was  going  to  find,  too.  It  was  a  gol- 
den sunset  in  more  ways  than  one  the  evening  before 
I  was  to  leave  for  the  upper  river.  Barred  and 
spangled  and  fluted  with  liquid,  lucent  gold  was  the 
sky  above  hills  that  were  tjiemselves  golden  with  the 
tints  of  early  autumn.  And  in  the  Northwest  there 
was  a  flush  of  rose,  old  rose  that  deepened  and  glowed 
in  lambent  crimson  where  a  notch  between  the  S el- 
kirks  and  Rockies  marked  the  approximate  location 
of  historic  Boat  Encampment.  "Great  things  have 
happened  at  Boat  Encampment,"  I  told  myself,  "and 
its  history  is  not  all  written.'*  Then:  "Sixteen  paces 
northwest  by  compass  from  the  foundation  of  the 
west  tower  of  the  abandoned  cable  ferry  .  .  ."  Sev- 
eral times  during  dinner  that  evening  I  had  to  check 
myself  from  humming  an  ancient  song.    "What's  that 


PREPARING  FOR  THE  BIG  BEND     19 

about,  'Yo,  ho,  ho  and  a  bottle  of  rum'?"  queried  the 
mackinaw  drummer  from  Winnipeg  who  sat  next  me. 
"I  thought  you  were  from  the  States.  I  don't  quite 
see  the  point." 

"It's  just  as  well  you  don't,"  I  replied,  and  was 
content  to  let  it  go  at  that. 


CHAPTER  II 

UP    HORSE    THIEF    CREEK 

When  I  started  north  from  Los  Angeles  toward 
the  end  of  August  Chester,  held  up  for  the  moment  by 
busmess,  was  hoping  to  be  able  to  shake  free  so  as  to 
arrive  on  the  upper  Columbia  by  the  time  I  had  ar- 
rangements for  the  Big  Bend  voyage  complete.  We 
would  then  go  together  to  the  Lake  of  the  Hangmg 
Glaciers  before  embarking  on  the  Bend  venture. 
Luck  was  not  with  him,  however.  The  day  I  was 
ready  to  start  on  up  river  from  Golden  I  received  a 
wire  stating  that  he  was  still  indefinitely  delayed,  and 
that  the  best  that  there  was  now  any  chance  of  his 
doing  would  be  to  join  me  for  the  Bend.  He  had 
ordered  his  cameraman  to  Windermere,  where  full 
directions  for  the  trip  to  the  glaciers  awaited  hmi.  He 
hoped  I  would  see  fit  to  go  along  and  help  with  the 
picture,  as  some  "central  figure"  besides  the  guides 
and  packers  would  be  needed  to  give  the  "story"  con- 
tinuity. I  replied  that  I  would  be  glad  to  do  the  best 
I  could,  and  left  for  Lake  Windermere  by  the  next 
train.  Few  movie  stars  have  ever  been  called  to 
twinkle  upon  shorter  notice. 

One  is  usually  told  that  the  source  of  the  Columbia 
is  in  Canal  Flats,  a  hundred  and  fifty  miles  above  Gol- 
den, and  immediately  south  of  a  wonderfully  lovely 
mountain-begirt  lake  that  bears  the  same  name  as  the 
river.    This  is  true  in  a  sense,  although,  strictly  speak- 

20 


UP  HORSE  THIEF  CREEK  21 

ing,  the  real  source  of  the  river — the  one  rising  at  the 
point  the  greatest  distance  from  its  mouth — would  be 
the  longest  of  the  many  mountain  creeks  which  con- 
verge upon  Columbia  Lake  from  the  encompassing 
amphitheatre  of  the  Rockies  and  Selkirks.  This  is 
probably  Dutch  Creek,  which  rises  in  the  perpetual 
snow  of  the  Selkirks  and  sends  down  a  roaring  tor- 
rent of  grey-green  glacier  water  into  the  western  side 
of  Columbia  Lake.  Scarcely  less  distant  from  the 
mouth  of  the  Columbia  are  the  heads  of  Toby  and 
Horse  Thief  creeks,  both  of  which  bring  splendid 
volumes  of  water  to  the  mother  river  just  below  Lake 
Windermere. 

It  was  the  presence  of  the  almost  totally  unknown 
Lake  of  the  Hanging  Glaciers  near  the  head  of  the 
Horse  Thief  Creek  watershed  that  was  responsible 
for  Chester's  determination  to  carry  his  preliminary 
explorations  up  to  the  latter  source  of  the  Columbia 
rather  than  to  one  slightly  more  remote  above  the 
upper  lake.  AYe  had  assurance  that  a  trail,  upon 
which  work  had  been  in  progress  all  summer,  would 
be  completed  by  the  middle  of  September,  so  that  it 
would  then  be  possible  for  the  first  time  to  take  pack- 
horses  and  a  full  moving-picture  outfit  to  one  of  the 
rarest  scenic  gems  on  the  North  American  continent, 
the  Lake  of  the  Hanging  Glaciers.  To  get  the  first 
movies  of  what  is  claimed  to  be  the  only  lake  in  the 
world  outside  of  the  polar  regions  that  has  icebergs 
perpetually  floating  upon  its  surface  was  the  principal 
object  of  Chester  in  directing  his  outfit  up  Horse 
Thief  Creek.  My  own  object  was  to  reach  one  of  the 
several  points  where  the  Columbia  took  its  rise  in  the 


22  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

glacial  ice,  there  to  do  a  right-about  and  start  upon  my 
long-dreamed-of  journej^  from  snow-flake  to  brine. 

It  is  a  dozen  years  or  more  since  one  could  travel 
the  hundred  miles  of  the  Columbia  between  Golden 
and  Lake  Windermere  by  steamer.  The  compara- 
tively sparse  population  in  this  rich  but  thinly  settled 
region  was  not  sufficient  to  support  both  rail  and 
river  transport,  and  with  the  coming  of  the  former 
the  latter  could  not  long  be  maintained.  Two  or 
three  rotting  hulks  on  the  mud  by  the  old  landing  at 
Golden  are  all  that  remain  of  one  of  the  most  pic- 
turesque steamer  services  ever  rim,  for  those  old 
stern-wheelers  used  to  flounder  up  the  Columbia  to 
Windermere,  on  through  Mud  and  Columbia  I^akes 
to  Canal  Flats,  through  a  log-built  lock  to  the  Koote- 
nay  watershed,  and  then  down  the  winding  canyons 
and  tumbling  rapids  of  that  tempestuous  stream  to 
Jennings,  Montana.  Those  were  the  bonanza  days 
of  the  upper  Columbia  and  Kootenay — such  days  as 
they  have  never  seen  since  nor  will  ever  see  again. 
I  was  to  hear  much  of  them  later  from  Captain  Arm- 
strong when  we  voyaged  a  stretch  of  the  lower  river 
together. 

There  is  a  train  between  Golden  and  Windermere 
only  three  times  a  week.  It  is  an  amiable,  ambling 
"jerk-water,"  whose  conductor  does  everything  from 
dandling  babies  to  unloading  lumber.  At  one  station 
he  held  over  for  five  minutes  to  let  me  run  down  to  a 
point  where  I  could  get  the  best  light  on  a  "reflec- 
tion" picture  in  the  river,  and  at  another  he  ran  the 
whole  train  back  to  pick  up  a  basket  of  eggs  which 
had  been  overlooked  in  the  rush  of  departure.     The 


UP  HORSE  THIEF  CREEK  23 

Canadian  Pacific  has  the  happy  faculty  of  being  all 
things  to  all  men.  Its  main  line  has  always  impressed 
me  as  being  the  best-run  road  I  have  ever  travelled  on 
in  any  part  of  the  world,  including  the  United  States. 
One  would  hardly  characterize  its  little  country  feed- 
ers in  the  same  words,  but  even  these  latter,  as  the 
instances  I  have  noted  will  bear  out,  come  about  as 
near  to  being  run  for  the  accommodation  of  the  travel- 
ling public  as  anything  one  will  ever  find.  There  is 
not  the  least  need  of  hurrying  this  Golden- Winder- 
mere express.  It  stops  over  night  at  Invermere  any- 
way, before  continuing  its  leisurely  progress  south- 
ward the  next  morning. 

Chester's  cameraman  met  me  with  a  car  at  the  sta- 
tion, and  we  rode  a  mile  to  the  hotel  at  Invermere,  on 
the  heights  above  the  lake.  His  name  was  Roos,  he 
said — Len  H.  Roos  of  N.  Y.  C.  It  was  his  misfor- 
tune to  have  been  born  in  Canada,  he  explained,  but 
he  had  always  had  a  great  admiration  for  Americans, 
and  had  taken  out  his  first  papers  for  citizenship.  He 
could  manage  to  get  on  with  Canadians  in  a  pinch, 
he  averred  further;  but  as  for  Britishers — no  "Lime- 
juicers"  for  him,  with  their  "G'bly'me's"  and  after- 
noon teas.  I  saw  that  this  was  going  to  be  a  difiicult 
companion,  and  took  the  occasion  to  point  out  that, 
since  he  was  going  to  be  in  Canada  for  some  weeks,  it 
might  be  just  as  well  to  bottle  up  his  rancour  against 
the  land  of  his  birth  until  he  was  back  on  the  other 
side  of  the  line  and  had  completed  the  honour  he  in- 
tended to  do  Uncle  Sam  by  becoming  an  American 
citizen.  Maybe  I  was  right,  he  admitted  thought- 
fully ;  but  it  would  be  a  hard  thing  for  him  to  do,  as  he 


24  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

was  naturally  very  frank  and  outspoken  and  a  great 
believer  in  saying  just  what  he  thought  of  people  and 
things. 

He  was  right  about  being  outspoken.  He  had 
also  rather  a  glittering  line  of  dogma  on  the  finer 
things  of  life.  Jazz  was  the  highest  form  of  music 
(he  ought  to  know,  for  had  he  not  played  both  jazz 
and  grand  opera  when  he  was  head  drummer  of  the 
Gait,  Ontario,  town  band?)  ;  the  Mack  Sennett  bath- 
ing comedy  was  his  belle,  ideal  of  kinematic  art;  and 
the  newspapers  of  William  Hearst  were  the  supreme 
development  of  journalism.  This  latter  he  knew,  be- 
cause he  had  done  camera  work  for  a  Hearst  syndi- 
cate himself.  I  could  manage  to  make  a  few  degrees 
of  allowance  for  jazz  and  the  Mack  Sennett  knocka- 
bouts under  the  circmnstances,  but  the  deification  of 
Hearst  created  an  unbridgeable  gulf.  I  foresaw  that 
"director"  and  "star"  were  going  to  have  bumpy 
sledding,  but  also  perceived  the  possibility  of  comedy 
elements  which  promised  to  go  a  long  way  toward  re- 
deeming the  enforced  partnership  from  irksomeness, 
that  is,  if  the  latter  were  not  too  prolonged.  That  it 
could  run  to  six  or  seven  weeks  and  the  passage  of 
near  to  a  thousand  miles  of  the  Columbia  without 
turning  both  "director"  and  "star"  into  actual  assas- 
sins, I  would  never  have  believed.  Indeed,  I  am 
not  able  to  figure  out  even  now  how  it  could  have 
worked  out  that  way.  I  can't  explain  it.  I  merely 
state  the  fact. 

Walter  Nixon,  the  packer  who  was  to  take  us  "up 
Horse  Thief,"  had  been  engaged  by  wire  a  week  pre- 
viously.   His  outfit  had  been  ready  for  several  days, 


UP  HORSE  THIEF  CREEK  25 

and  he  called  at  the  hotel  the  evening  of  my  arrival 
to  go  over  the  grub  list  and  make  definite  plans.  As 
there  were  only  two  of  us,  he  reckoned  that  ten  horses 
and  two  packers  would  be  sufficient  to  see  us  through. 
The  horses  would  cost  us  two  dollars  a  day  a  head,  and 
the  packers  five  dollars  apiece.  The  provisions  he 
would  buy  himself  and  endeavour  to  board  us  at  a 
dollar  and  a  half  apiece  a  man.  This  footed  up  to 
between  thirty-five  and  forty  dollars  a  day  for  the 
outfit,  exclusive  of  the  movie  end.  It  seemed  a  bit 
stiff  offhand,  but  was  really  very  reasonable  consider- 
ing present  costs  of  doing  that  kind  of  a  thing  and  the 
thoroughly  first-class  service  Nixon  gave  us  from  be- 
ginning to  end. 

Nixon  himself  I  was  extremely  well  impressed  with. 
He  was  a  fine  up-standing  fellow  of  six  feet  or  more, 
black-haired,  black-eyed,  broad-shouldered  and  a 
swell  of  biceps  and  thigh  that  even  his  loose-fitting 
mackinaws  could  not  entirely  conceal.  I  liked  partic- 
ularly his  simple  rig-out,  in  its  pleasing  contrast 
to  the  cross-between-a-movie-cowboy-and-a-Tyrolean- 
yodeler  garb  that  has  come  to  be  so  much  affected 
by  the  so-called  guides  at  Banff  and  Lake  Louise. 
Like  the  best  of  his  kind,  Nixon  was  quiet-spoken  and 
leisurely  of  movement,  but  with  a  suggestion  of 
powerful  reserves  of  both  vocabulary  and  activity.  I 
felt  sure  at  first  sight  that  he  was  the  sort  of  a  man 
who  could  be  depended  upon  to  see  a  thing  through 
whatever  the  difficulties,  and  I  never  had  reason  to 
change  my  opinion  on  that  score. 

It  was  arranged  that  night  that  Nixon  should  get 
away  with  the  pack  outfit  by  noon  of  the  next  day,  and 


26  DOWX  THE  COLUMBIA 

make  an  easy  stage  of  it  to  the  Starbird  Ranch,  at  the 
end  of  the  wagon-road,  nineteen  miles  out  from  Inver- 
mere.  The  following  morning  Roos  and  I  would 
come  out  by  motor  and  be  ready  to  start  by  the  time 
the  horses  were  up  and  the  packs  on.  That  gave  us 
an  extra  day  for  exploring  Windermere  and  the  more 
imminent  sources  of  the  Columbia. 

Roos'  instructions  from  Chester  called  for  a 
"Windermere  Picture,"  in  which  should  be  shown  the 
scenic,  camping,  fishing  and  hunting  life  of  that  re- 
gion. The  scenic  and  camping  shots  he  had  already 
made;  the  fish  and  the  game  had  eluded  him.  I  ar- 
rived just  in  time  to  take  part  in  the  final  scurry  to 
complete  the  picture.  The  fish  to  be  shown  were 
trout,  and  the  game  mountain  sheep  and  goat,  or  at 
least  that  was  the  way  Roos  planned  it  at  breakfast 
time.  When  inquiry  revealed  that  it  would  take  a  day 
to  reach  a  trout  stream,  and  three  days  to  penetrate  to 
the  haunts  of  the  sheep  and  goats,  he  modified  the 
campaign  somewhat  to  conform  with  the  limited  time 
at  our  disposal.  Close  at  hand  in  the  lake  there  was 
a  fish  called  the  squaw-fish,  which,  floundering  at  the 
end  of  a  line,  would  photograph  almost  like  a  trout,  or 
so  the  hotel  proprietor  thought.  And  the  best  of  it 
was  that  any  one  could  catch  them.  Indeed,  at  times 
one  had  to  manoeuvre  to  keep  them  from  taking  the 
bait  that  was  meant  for  the  more  gamy  and  edible, 
but  also  far  more  elusive,  ling  or  fresh-water  cod. 
As  for  the  game  picture,  said  Roos,  he  would  save 
time  by  having  a  deer  rounded  up  and  driven  into  the 
lake,  where  he  would  pursue  it  with  a  motor  boat  and 
shoot  the  required  hunting  pictures.    He  would  like 


UP  HORSE  THIEF  CREEK  27 

to  have  me  dress  like  a  tourist  and  do  the  hunting  and 
fishing.  That  would  break  me  in  to  adopting  an  easy 
and  pleasing  manner  before  the  camera,  so  that  a 
minimum  of  film  would  be  spoiled  when  he  got  down 
to  our  regular  work  on  the  Hanging  Glacier  picture. 
It  wouldn't  take  long.  That  was  the  advantage  of 
"news"  training  for  a  cameraman.  You  could  do 
things  in  a  rush  when  you  had  to. 

Mr.  Clelland,  secretary  of  the  Windermere  Com- 
pany, courteously  found  us  tackle  and  drove  us  down 
to  the  outlet  of  the  lake  to  catch  the  squaw-fish. 
Three  hours  later  he  drove  us  back  to  the  hotel  for 
lunch  without  one  single  fragment  of  our  succulent 
salt-pork  bait  having  been  nuzzled  on  its  hook.  I 
lost  my  "easy  and  pleasing  manner"  at  the  end  of  the 
first  hour,  and  Roos — who  was  under  rather  greater 
tension  in  standing  by  to  crank — somewhat  sooner. 
He  said  many  unkind  things  about  fish  in  general  and 
squaw-fish  in  particular  before  we  gave  up  the  fight 
at  noon,  and  I  didn't  improve  matters  at  all  by  sug- 
gesting that  I  cut  out  the  picture  on  a  salmon  can 
label,  fasten  it  to  my  hook,  and  have  him  shoot  me 
catching  that.  There  was  no  sense  whatever  in  the 
idea,  he  said.  You  had  to  have  studio  lighting  to  get 
away  with  that  sort  of  thing.  He  couldn't  see  how  I 
could  advance  such  a  thing  seriously.  As  I  had  some 
doubts  on  that  score  myself,  I  didn't  start  an  argu- 
ment. 

In  the  afternoon  no  better  success  attended  our 
effort  to  make  the  hunting  picture, — this  because  no 
one  seemed  to  know  where  a  deer  could  be  rounded  up 
and  driven  into  the  lake.    Again  I  discovered  a  way 


28  DOWN  THE  COLU^MBIA 

to  save  this  situation.  On  the  veranda  of  the  country 
club  there  was  a  fine  mounted  specimen  of  Ovis  Cana- 
denms,  the  Canadian  mountain  slieep.  By  proper 
ballasting,  I  pointed  out  to  Roos,  this  fine  animal 
could  be  made  to  submerge  to  a  natural  swimming 
depth — say  with  the  head  and  shoulders  just  above 
the  water.  Then  a  little  Evinrude  engine  could  be 
clamped  to  its  hind  quarters  and  set  going.  Forth- 
with the  whole  thing  must  start  off  ploughing  across 
the  lake  just  like  a  live  mountain  sheep.  By  a  little 
manoeuvring  it  ought  to  be  possible  to  shoot  at  an 
angle  that  would  interpose  the  body  of  the  sheep  be- 
tween the  eye  and  the  pushing  engine.  If  this  proved 
to  be  impossible,  perhaps  it  could  be  explained  in  a 
sub-title  that  the  extraneous  machinery  was  a  frag- 
ment of  mowing-machine  or  something  of  the  kind 
that  the  sheep  had  collided  with  and  picked  up  in  his 
flight.  Roos,  while  admitting  that  this  showed  a  con- 
siderable advance  over  my  salmon-label  suggestion  of 
the  morning,  said  that  there  were  a  number  of  limiting 
considerations  which  would  render  it  impracticable.  I 
forget  what  all  of  these  were,  but  one  of  them  was 
that  our  quarry  couldn't  be  made  to  roll  his  eyes  and 
register  "consternation"  and  "mute  reproach"  in  the 
close-ups.  I  began  to  see  that  there  was  a  lot  more 
to  the  movie  game  than  I  had  ever  dreamed.  But 
what  a  stimulator  of  the  imagination  it  was ! 

As  there  was  nothing  more  to  be  done  about  the 
hunting  and  fishing  shots  for  the  present,  we  turned 
our  attention  to  final  preparations  for  what  we  had 
begun  to  call  the  "Hanging  Glacier  Picture."    Roos 


UP  HORSE  THIEF  CREEK  29 

said  it  would  be  necessary  to  sketch  a  rough  sort  of 
scenario  in  advance — nothing  elaborate  like  "Broken 
Blossoms"  or  "The  Perils  of  Pauline"  (we  hadn't  the 
company  for  that  kind  of  thing),  but  just  the  thread 
of  a  story  to  make  the  "continuity"  ripple  continu- 
ously. It  would  be  enough,  he  thought,  if  I  would 
enact  the  role  of  a  gentleman-sportsman  and  allow 
the  guides  and  packers  to  be  just  their  normal  selves. 
Then  with  these  circulating  in  the  foreground,  he 
would  film  the  various  scenic  features  of  the  trip  as 
they  unrolled.  All  the  lot  of  us  would  have  to  do 
would  be  to  act  naturally  and  stand  or  lounge  grace- 
fully in  those  parts  of  the  picture  where  the  presence 
of  human  beings  would  be  best  calculated  to  balance 
effectively  and  harmoniously  the  composition.  I 
agreed  cheerfully  to  the  sportsman  part  of  my  role, 
but  demurred  as  to  "gentleman."  I  might  manage  it 
for  a  scene,  but  for  a  sustained  effort  it  was  out  of  the 
question.  A  compromise  along  this  line  was  finally 
effected.  I  engaged  to  act  as  much  like  a  gentleman 
as  I  could  for  the  opening  shot,  after  which  I  was  to 
be  allowed  to  lapse  into  the  seeming  of  a  simple 
sportsman  who  loved  scenery-gazing  more  than  the 
pursuit  and  slaying  of  goat,  sheep  and  bear.  Roos 
observed  shrewdly  that  it  would  be  better  to  have  the 
sportsman  be  more  interested  in  scenery  than  game 
because,  judging  from  our  experience  at  Winder- 
mere, we  would  find  more  of  the  former  than  the  lat- 
ter. He  was  also  encouragingly  sympathetic  about 
my  transient  appearance  as  a  gentleman.  "I  only 
want  about  fifty  feet  of  that,"  he  said  as  he  gave  me 


30  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

a  propitiating  pat  on  the  back;  "besides,  it's  all  a 
matter  of  clothes  anyhow." 

Before  we  turned  in  that  night  it  transpired  that 
Chester's  hope  of  being  the  first  to  show  moving  pic- 
tures of  the  Lake  of  the  Hanging  Glaciers  to  the 
world  was  probably  doomed  to  disappointment,  or, 
at  the  best,  that  this  honour  would  have  to  be  shared 
with  an  equally  ambitious  rival.  Byron  Harmon,  of 
Banff,  formerly  official  photographer  for  the  Ca- 
nadian Pacific,  arrived  at  Invermere  and  announced 
that  he  was  planning  to  go  "u^^  Horse  Thief"  and  en- 
deavour to  film  a  number  of  the  remarkable  scenic  fea- 
tures which  he  had  hitherto  tried  to  picture  in  vain. 
His  schedule  was  temporarily  upset  by  the  fact  that 
we  had  already  engaged  the  best  pack-train  and 
guides  available.  Seasoned  mountaineer  that  he  was, 
however,  this  was  of  small  moment.  A  few  hours' 
scurrying  about  had  provided  him  with  a  light  but 
ample  outfit,  consisting  of  four  horses  and  two  men, 
with  which  he  planned  to  get  away  in  the  morning. 
He  was  not  in  the  least  perturbed  by  the  fact  that 
Roos  had  practically  a  day's  start  of  him.  "There's 
room  for  a  hundred  cameramen  to  work  up  there,"  he 
told  me  genially;  "and  the  more  the  world  is  shown  of 
the  wonders  of  the  Rockies  and  the  Selkirks,  the  more 
it  will  want  to  see.  It  will  be  good  to  have  your  com- 
pany, and  each  of  us  ought  to  be  of  help  to  the  other." 

I  had  some  difficulty  in  bringing  Roos  to  a  similarly 
philosophical  viewpoint.  His  "Hearst"  training  im- 
pelled him  to  brook  no  rivalry,  to  beat  out  the  other 
man  by  any  means  that  offered.  He  had  the  better 
packtrain,  he  said,  to  say  nothing  of  a  day's  start. 


UP  HORSE  THIEF  CREEK  31 

Also,  he  had  the  only  dynamite  and  caps  available  that 
side  of  Golden,  so  that  he  would  have  the  inside  track 
for  starting  avalanches  and  creating  artificial  ice- 
bergs in  the  Lake  of  the  Hanging  Glaciers.  I  would 
like  to  think  that  it  was  my  argument  that,  since  it 
was  not  a  "news"  picture  he  was  after,  the  man  who 
took  the  most  time  to  his  work  would  be  the  one  to  get 
the  best  results,  was  what  brought  him  round  finally. 
I  greatly  fear,  however,  it  was  the  knowledge  that  the 
generous  Harmon  had  a  number  of  flares  that  did  the 
trick.  He  had  neglected  to  provide  flares  himself,  and 
without  them  work  in  the  ice  caves — second  only  in 
interest  to  the  Lake  of  the  Hanging  Glaciers  itself — 
would  be  greatly  circumscribed.  At  any  rate,  he 
finally  agreed  to  a  truce,  and  we  took  Harmon  out  to 
the  end  of  the  road  in  our  car  the  following  morning. 
Of  the  latter's  really  notable  work  in  picturing  the 
mountains  of  western  Canada  I  shall  write  later. 

The  horses  were  waiting,  saddled  and  packed,  as 
we  drove  up  to  the  rendezvous.  The  packer  was  a 
powerfully  built  fellow,  with  his  straight  black  hair 
and  high  cheek  bones  betokening  a  considerable  mix- 
ture of  Indian  blood.  His  name  was  Buckman — Jim 
Buckman.  He  was  the  village  blacksmith  of  Athal- 
mere,  Nixon  explained.  He  was  making  plenty  of 
money  in  his  trade,  but  was  willing  to  come  along  at  a 
packer's  wage  for  the  sake  of  the  experience  as  an 
actor.  The  lure  of  the  movies  was  also  responsible  for 
the  presence  of  Nixon's  fourteen-year-old  son,  Gor- 
don, who  had  threatened  to  run  away  from  home  if  he 
wasn't  allowed  to  come  along.  He  proved  a  useful 
acquisition — more  than  sufficiently  so,  it  seemed  to 


32  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

me,  to  compensate  for  what  he  did  to  the  jam  and 
honey. 

Roos  called  us  around  him  and  gave  instructions 
for  the  "business"  of  the  opening  shot.  Nixon  and 
Jim  were  to  be  "picked  up"  taking  the  last  of  the 
slack  out  of  a  "diamond  hitch,"  Gordon  frolicking  in 
the  background  with  his  dog.  When  the  car  drove 
up,  Nixon  was  to  take  my  saddle  horse  by  the  bridle, 
walk  up  and  shake  hands  with  me.  Then,  to  make 
the  transition  from  Civilization  to  the  Primitive 
(movie  people  never  miss  a  chance  to  use  that  word) 
with  a  click,  I  was  to  step  directly  from  the  car  into 
my  stirrups.  "Get  me!"  admonished  Roos;  "straight 
from  the  running  board  to  the  saddle.  Don't  touch 
the  ground  at  all.  Make  it  snappy,  all  of  you.  I 
don't  want  any  of  you  to  grow  into  'foot-lice.'  " 

My  saddle  horse  turned  out  to  be  a  stockily-built 
grey  of  over  1200  pounds.  He  looked  hard  as  nails 
and  to  have  no  end  of  endurance.  But  his  shifty  eye 
and  back-laid  ears  indicated  temperamentality,  so  that 
Nixon's  warning  that  he  "warn't  exactly  a  lady's 
hawss"  was  a  bit  superfluous.  "When  you  told  me 
you  tipped  the  beam  at  two-forty,"  he  said,  "I  know'd 
'Grayback'  was  the  only  hawss  that'd  carry  you  up 
these  trails.  So  I  brung  him  in,  and  stuffed  him  up 
with  oats,  and  here  he  is.  He  may  dance  a  leetle  on 
his  toes  jest  now,  but  he'll  gentle  down  a  lot  by  the 
end  of  a  week." 

Whether  "Grayback"  mastered  all  of  the  "busi- 
ness" of  that  shot  or  not  is  probably  open  to  doubt, 
but  that  he  took  the  "Make  it  snappy!"  part  to  heart 
there  was  no  question.     He  came  alongside  like  a 


UP  HORSE  THIEF  CREEK  33 

lamb,  but  the  instant  I  started  to  make  my  transition 
from  "Civilization  to  the  Primitive  with  a  click"  he 
started  climbing  into  the  car.  The  only  click  I  heard 
was  when  my  ear  hit  the  ground.  Roos  couldn't  have 
spoiled  any  more  film  than  I  did  cuticle,  but,  being  a 
"Director,"  he  made  a  good  deal  more  noise  about  it. 
After  barking  his  hocks  on  the  fender,  "Grayback" 
refused  to  be  enticed  within  mounting  distance  of  the 
car  again,  so  finally,  with  a  comparatively  un-clicky 
transition  from  Civilization  to  the  Primitive,  I  got 
aboard  by  the  usual  route  from  the  ground. 

The  next  shot  was  a  quarter  of  a  mile  farther  up 
the  trail.  Here  Roos  found  a  natural  sylvan  frame 
through  which  to  shoot  the  whole  outfit  as  it  came 
stringing  along.  Unfortunately,  the  "Director" 
failed  to  tell  the  actors  not  to  look  at  the  camera — 
that,  once  and  for  all,  the  clicking  box  must  be  reck- 
oned as  a  thing  non-existent — and  it  all  had  to  be  done 
over  again.  The  next  time  it  was  better,  but  the  ac- 
tors still  had  a  wooden  expression  on  their  faces. 
They  didn't  look  at  the  camera,  but  the  expression  on 
their  faces  showed  that  they  were  conscious  of  it. 
Roos  then  instructed  me  to  talk  to  my  companions,  or 
sing,  or  do  anything  that  would  take  their  minds  off 
the  camera  and  make  them  appear  relaxed  and  nat- 
ural. That  time  we  did  it  famously.  As  each,  in 
turn,  cantered  by  the  sylvan  bower  with  its  clicking 
camera  he  was  up  to  his  neck  "doing  something." 
Nixon  was  declaiming  Lincoln's  Gettysburg  speech 
as  he  had  learned  it  from  his  phonograph,  Gordon  was 
calling  his  dog,  Jim  was  larruping  a  straggling  pinto 
and  cursing  it  in  fluent  local  idiom,  and  I  was  singing 


34  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

"Onward,  Christian  Soldiers!"  We  never  had  any- 
trouble  about  "being  natural"  after  that;  but  I  hope 
no  lip  reader  ever  sees  the  pictures. 

After  picking  up  Roos  and  his  camera  we  made 
our  real  start.  One  pack-horse  was  reserved  for  the 
camera  and  tripod,  and  to  prevent  him  from  ranging 
from  the  trail  and  bumping  the  valuable  apparatus 
against  trees  or  rocks,  his  halter  was  tied  to  the  tail 
of  Nixon's  saddle  animal.  Except  that  the  latter's 
spinal  column  must  have  suffered  some  pretty  severe 
snakings  when  the  camera-carrier  went  through  cor- 
duroy bridges  or  lost  his  footings  in  fords,  the  ar- 
rangement worked  most  successfully.  The  delicate 
instrument  was  not  in  the  least  injured  in  all  of  the 
many  miles  it  was  jogged  over  some  of  the  roughest 
trails  I  have  ever  travelled. 

The  sunshine  by  which  the  last  of  the  trail  shots  was 
made  proved  the  parting  glimmer  of  what  had  been  a 
month  or  more  of  practically  unbroken  fair  weather. 
Indeed,  the  weather  had  been  rather  too  fine,  for, 
toward  the  end  of  the  summer,  lack  of  rain  in  western 
Canada  invariably  means  forest  fires.  As  these  had 
been  raging  intermittently  for  several  weeks  all  over 
British  Columbia,  the  air  had  become  thick  with 
smoke,  and  at  many  places  it  was  impossible  to  see 
for  more  than  a  mile  or  two  in  any  direction.  Both 
Roos  and  Harmon  had  been  greatly  hampered  in 
their  work  about  Banff  and  Lake  Louise  by  the 
smoke,  and  both  were,  therefore,  exceedingly  anxious 
for  early  and  copious  rains  to  clear  the  air.  Other- 
wise, they  said,  there  was  no  hope  of  a  picture  of  the 
Lake  of  the  Hanging  Glaciers  that  would  be  worth 


UP  HORSE  THIEF  CREEK  35 

the  film  it  was  printed  on.  They  must  have  rain. 
Their  prayer  was  about  to  be  answered,  in  full  meas- 
ure, pressed  down  and  running  over — and  then  some. 

We  had  been  encountering  contending  currents  of 
hot  and  cold  air  all  the  way  up  the  wagon-road  from 
Invermere  and  the  lower  valley.  Now,  as  we  entered 
the  mountains,  these  became  more  pronounced,  taking 
the  form  of  scurrying  "dust-devils"  that  attacked 
from  flank  and  van  without  method  or  premonitory 
signal.  The  narrowing  gorge  ahead  was  packed  solid 
with  a  sullen  phalanx  of  augmenting  clouds,  sombre- 
hued  and  sagging  with  moisture,  and  frequently  il- 
lumined with  forked  lightning  flashes  discharged  from 
their  murky  depths.  Nixon,  anxious  to  make  camp 
before  the  storm  broke,  jogged  the  horses  steadily  all 
through  the  darkening  afternoon.  It  was  a  point 
called  "Sixteen-mile"  he  was  driving  for,  the  first 
place  we  would  reach  where  there  was  room  for  the 
tent  and  feed  for  the  horses.  We  were  still  four 
miles  short  of  our  destination  when  the  first  spatter 
of  ranging  droj)s  opened  up,  and  from  there  on  the 
batteries  of  the  storm  concentrated  on  us  all  the  way. 

We  made  camp  in  a  rain  driving  solidly  enough  to 
deflect  the  stroke  of  an  axe.  I  shall  not  enlarge  upon 
the  acute  discomfort  of  it.  Those  who  have  done  it 
will  understand;  those  who  have  not  would  never  be 
able  to.  It  was  especially  trying  on  the  first  day  out, 
before  the  outfit  had  become  shaken  down  and  one  had 
learned  where  to  look  for  things.  Nixon's  consum- 
mate woodcraftsmanship  was  put  to  a  severe  test, 
but  emerged  triumphant.  So,  too,  Jim,  who  proved 
himself  as  impervious  to  rain  as  to  ill-temper.     The 


36  DOWN  THE  COLU^MBIA 

fir  boiiglis  for  the  tent  floor  came  in  dripping,  of 
course,  but  there  were  enough  dry  tarpaulins  and 
blankets  to  blot  up  the  heaviest  of  the  moisture,  and 
the  glowing  little  sheet-iron  stove  licked  up  the  rest. 
A  piping  hot  dinner  drove  out  the  last  of  the  chill, 
and  we  sj^ent  a  snug,  comfy  evening  listening  to  Nixon 
yarn  about  his  mountaineering  exploits  and  of  the 
queer  birds  from  New  York  and  London  whom  he  had 
nursed  through  strange  and  various  intervals  of 
moose  and  sheep-hunting  in  the  Kootenays  and 
Rockies.  We  slept  dry  but  rather  cold,  especially 
Roos,  who  ended  up  by  curling  round  the  stove  and 
stoking  between  shivers.  Nixon  and  Jim  drew  gen- 
erously on  their  own  blanket  rolls  to  help  the  both  of 
us  confine  our  ebbing  animal  heat,  and  yet  appeared 
to  find  not  the  least  difficulty  in  sleeping  comfortably 
under  half  the  weight  of  cover  that  left  us  shaking. 
It  was  all  a  matter  of  what  one  was  used  to,  of  course, 
and  in  a  few  days  we  began  to  harden. 

It  was  September  tenth  that  we  had  started  from 
Invermere,  hoping  at  the  time  to  be  able  to  accomplish 
what  we  had  set  out  to  do  in  from  four  to  six  days. 
The  rain  which  had  come  to  break  the  long  dry  spell 
put  a  very  different  face  on  things,  however.  The 
eleventh,  twelfth  and  thirteenth  we  were  held  in  our 
first  camp  by  an  almost  continuous  downpour,  which 
turned  the  mountain  streams  into  torrents  and  raised 
Horse  Thief  till  it  lapped  over  the  rim  of  the  flat 
upon  which  our  tent  was  pitched.  The  night  of  the 
thirteenth,  with  a  sharp  drop  of  the  temperature,  the 
rain  turned  to  snow,  and  we  crawled  out  on  the  four- 
teenth to  find  the  valley  under  a  light  blanket  of 


UP  HORSE  THIEF  CREEK  37 

white.  Then  the  clouds  broke  away  and  the  sunshine 
and  shadows  began  playing  tag  over  the  scarps  and 
buttresses  of  the  encompassing  amphitheatre  of 
mountains.  For  the  first  time  there  was  a  chance  for 
a  glimpse  of  the  new  world  into  which  we  had  come. 
The  transition  from  the  cultivation  and  the  gentle 
wooded  slopes  of  Windermere  was  startling.  Under 
the  mask  of  the  storm  clouds  we  had  penetrated  from 
a  smooth,  rounded,  pleasant  country  to  one  that  was 
cliffy  and  pinnacled  and  bare — a  country  that  was  all 
on  end,  a  land  whose  bones  showed  through.  A  tow- 
ering JNIatterhorn  reared  its  head  six  or  eight  thou- 
sand feet  above  us,  and  so  near  that  slabs  of  rock 
cracked  away  from  its  scarred  summit  were  lying 
just  across  the  trail  from  the  tent.  The  peaks  walling 
in  Horse  Thief  to  the  north  were  not  so  high  but  no 
less  precipitous  and  barren,  while  to  the  west  a  jumble 
of  splintered  pinnacles  whose  bases  barred  the  way 
were  still  lost  in  the  witch-dance  of  the  clouds.  A 
tourist  folder  would  have  called  it  a  "Land  of  Ti- 
tans," but  Jim,  leaning  on  his  axe  after  nicking  off  a 
fresh  back-log  for  the  camp  fire,  merely  opined  it  was 
"some  skookum  goat  country.  But  not  a  patch,"  he 
added,  "to  what  we'll  be  hittin'  to-night  if  we  get  them 
geesly  hawsses  rounded  up  in  time  fer  a  start  'fore 
noon." 

It  appeared  that  the  horses,  with  their  grazing 
spoiled  by  the  snow,  had  become  restless,  broken 
through  the  barrier  Nixon  had  erected  at  a  bridge  just 
below  camp,  and  started  on  the  back  trail  for  Inver- 
merv..  As  their  tracks  showed  that  they  had  broken 
into  a  trot  immediately  beyond  the  bridge,  it  looked 


38  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

like  a  long  stern-chase,  and  Nixon  did  not  reckon  on 
being  able  to  hit  the  trail  for  several  hours.  Roos 
grasped  the  occasion  to  make  a  couple  of  "camp  life" 
shots  his  fertile  brain  had  conceived  the  idea  of  during 
the  long  storm-bound  days  of  enforced  inaction.  In 
one  of  these  the  "sportsman"  was  to  go  to  bed  in  sil- 
houette by  candlelight.  Ostensibly  this  was  to  be  the 
shadow  of  a  man  crawling  into  his  blankets  inside  of 
the  tent,  and  taken  from  the  outside.  In  reality,  how- 
ever, Roos  set  up  his  camera  inside  of  the  tent  and 
shot  the  antics  of  the  shadow  the  sunlight  threw  on  the 
canvas  when  I  went  through  the  motions  of  turning  in 
close  against  the  outside  of  the  wall.  This  went  off 
smartly  and  snappily;  but  I  would  have  given  much 
for  a  translation  of  the  voluble  comments  of  a  passing 
Indian  who  pulled  up  to  watch  the  agile  action  of  the 
retiring  "sportsman." 

It  was  while  Roos  was  rehearsing  me  for  this  shot 
that  Gordon  must  have  heard  him  iterating  his  inva- 
riable injunction  that  I  should  not  be  a  "foot-hog," 
meaning,  I  shall  hardly  need  to  explain,  that  I  should 
be  quick  in  my  movements  so  as  not  to  force  him  to  use 
an  undue  footage  of  film.  A  little  later  I  overheard 
the  boj^  asking  Jim  what  a  "foot-hog"  was.  "I  don't 
quite  humtrux  myself,"  the  sturdy  blacksmith-packer 
replied,  scratching  his  head.  "It  sounds  as  if  it  might 
be  suthin  like  pig's  feet,  but  they  want  actin'  as  if 
they  wuz  ready  to  eat  anythin',  'less  it  was  each  other." 
Now  that  I  think  of  it,  I  can  see  how  the  clash  of  the 
artistic  temperaments  of  "Director"  and  "Star"  over 
just  about  every  one  of  the  shots  they  made  might 
have  given  Jim  that  impression. 


^Jk  *;-^' 


i 


r 


>.5ylK  • 


THE  "TURNliNG-IN"   SCENE   SHOT  IN  SILHOUETTE    {above) 
"REVERSE"  OF  THE  "GOING-TO-BED"  SHOT    (beloiv) 


UP  HORSE  THIEF  CREEK  39 

The  other  shot  we  made  that  morning  was  one 
which  Roos  had  labelled  as  "Berry  Picking  and  Eat- 
ing" in  his  tentative  scenario.  The  "sportsman"  was 
to  fare  forth,  gather  a  bowlful  of  raspberries,  bring 
them  back  to  camp,  put  sugar  and  condensed  milk  on 
them,  and  finally  eat  them,  all  before  the  camera.  I 
objected  to  appearing  in  this  for  two  reasons:  for  one, 
because  berry-picking  was  not  a  recognized  out-door 
sport,  and,  for  another,  because  I  didn't  like  rasp- 
berries. Roos  admitted  that  berry-picking  was  not  a 
sport,  but  insisted  he  had  to  have  the  scene  to  pre- 
serve his  continuity.  "Gathering  and  eating  these 
products  of  Nature,"  he  explained,  "shows  how  far 
the  gentleman  you  were  in  the  first  scene  has  de- 
scended toward  the  Primitive.  You  will  be  getting 
more  and  more  Primitive  right  along,  but  we  must 
register  each  step  on  the  film,  see?"  As  for  my  dis- 
taste for  raspberries,  Roos  was  quite  willing  that, 
after  displaying  the  berries  heaped  in  the  bowl  in  a 
close-up,  I  should  do  the  real  eating  with  strawberry 
jam.  It  was  that  last  which  overcame  my  spell  of 
"temperament."  Both  Roos  and  Gordon  already  had 
me  several  pots  down  in  the  matter  of  jam  consump- 
tion, and  I  was  glad  of  the  chance  to  climb  back  a 
notch. 

We  found  raspberry  bushes  by  the  acre  but,  thanks 
to  the  late  storm,  almost  no  berries.  This  didn't  mat- 
ter seriously  in  the  picking  shot,  for  which  I  managed 
to  convey  a  very  realistic  effect  in  pantomime,  but  for 
the  heaped-high  close-up  of  the  bowl  it  was  another 
matter.  One  scant  handful  was  the  best  that  the  four 
of  us,  foraging  for  half  an  hour,  could  bring  in.    But 


40  DOWN  THE  COLUIMBIA 

I  soon  figured  a  way  to  make  these  do.  Opening  a 
couple  of  tins  of  strawberry  jam  into  the  bowl,  I 
rounded  over  smoothly  the  bright  succulent  mass  and 
then  made  a  close-set  raspberry  mosaic  of  one  side  of 
it.  That  did  famously  for  the  close-up.  As  I  settled 
back  *for  the  berry-eating  shot  Roos  cut  in  sharply 
with  his  usual:  "Snappy  now!  Don't  be  a  foot-hog!" 
Gordon,  who  had  been  digging  his  toe  into  the  mud  for 
some  minutes,  evidently  under  considerable  mental 
stress,  lifted  his  head  at  the  word.  "Hadn't  you  bet- 
ter say  'jam-hog',  Mr.  Roos?"  he  queried  plaintively. 

"I'm  afraid  it  wouldn't  be  any  use,"  was  the  de- 
jected reply.  Roos  was  right.  At  the  word  "Ac- 
tion!" I  dug  in  with  my  spoon  on  the  unpaved  side  of 
the  bowl  of  jam,  and  several  turns  before  the  crank 
ceased  revolving  there  was  nothing  left  but  a  few 
daubed  raspberries  and  several  broad  red  smears  ra- 
diating from  my  mouth.  Roos  tossed  the  two  empty 
jam  tins  into  the  murky  torrent  of  Horse  Thief 
Creek  and  watched  them  bob  away  down  stream. 
"You're  getting  too  darn  primitive,"  he  said  peevishly. 

It  was  nearly  eleven  o'clock  before  Nixon  came 
with  the  horses;  but  we  had  camp  struck  and  the 
packs  made,  so  there  was  little  delay  in  taking  the 
trail.  The  bottom  of  the  valley  continued  fairly 
open  for  a  few  miles,  with  the  swollen  stream  serpen- 
tining across  it,  turned  hither  and  thither  by  huge  log- 
jams and  fortress-like  rock  islands.  Where  the  North 
Fork  came  tumbling  into  the  main  creek  in  a  fine  run 
of  cascades  there  was  a  flat  several  acres  in  extent  and 
good  camping  ground.  Immediately  above  the  val- 
ley narrowed  to  a  steep-sided  canyon,  and  continued 


UP  HORSE  THIEF  CREEK  41 

so  all  the  way  up  to  the  snow  and  glacier-line.  The 
trail  from  now  on  was  badly  torn  and  washed  and 
frequently  blocked  with  dead-falls.  Or  rather  it  had 
been  so  blocked  up  to  a  day  or  two  previously.  Now 
I  understood  the  reason  for  Nixon's  complaisance 
when  Harmon's  outfit,  travelling  in  the  rain,  had 
passed  our  camp  a  couple  of  days  before.  "Don't 
worry,  sonny,"  he  had  said  in  comforting  the  impetu- 
ous Roos;  "we  won't  lose  any  time,  and  we  will  save 
a  lot  of  chopping."  And  so  it  had  worked  out.  Har- 
mon's men  had  cut  the  dead-falls  out  of  the  whole 
twelve  miles  of  trail  between  North  Fork  and  the 
Dragon-Tail  Glacier. 

Even  so  it  was  a  beastly  stretch  of  trail.  The 
stream,  completely  filling  the  bottom  of  the  gorge, 
kept  the  path  always  far  up  the  side  of  the  momitain. 
There  were  few  dangerous  precipices,  but  one  had 
always  to  be  on  the  lookout  to  keep  his  head  from 
banging  on  dead-falls  just  high  enough  to  clear  a 
pack,  and  which,  therefore,  no  one  would  take  the 
trouble  to  cut  away.  The  close-growing  shrubbery 
was  dripping  with  moisture,  and  even  riding  second  to 
Nixon,  who  must  have  got  all  the  worst  of  it,  I  found 
myself  drenched  at  the  end  of  the  first  half  mile. 
Riding  through  wet  underbrush  can  wet  a  man  as  no 
rain  ever  could.  No  waterproof  ever  devised  oifers 
the  least  protection  against  it ;  nothing  less  than  a  safe 
deposit  vault  on  wheels  could  do  so. 

Streams,  swollen  by  the  now  rapidly  melting  snow, 
came  tumbling  down — half  cataract,  half  cascade — all 
along  the  way.  At  the  worst  crossings  these  had  been 
roughly  bridged,  as  little  footing  for  men  or  horses 


42  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

was  afforded  by  the  clean-swept  rock.  Only  one 
crossing  of  the  main  stream  was  necessary.  It  was  a 
good  natm-al  ford  at  low  water,  but  quite  out  of  the 
question  to  attempt  at  high.  We  found  it  about  me- 
dium— a  little  more  than  belly  deep  and  something 
like  an  eight-mile  current.  With  a  foot  more  water  it 
would  have  commenced  to  get  troublesome;  with 
another  two  feet,  really  dangerous.  That  prospect, 
with  the  rapidly  rising  water,  was  reserved  for  our 
return  trip. 

Such  a  road  was,  of  course,  wonderfully  pictur- 
esque and  colourful,  and  Roos,  with  a  quick  eye  for  an 
effective  composition,  made  the  most  of  his  oppor- 
tunities for  "trail  shots."  A  picture  of  this  kind, 
simple  enough  to  look  at  on  the  screen,  often  took  half 
an  hour  or  more  to  make.  The  finding  of  a  pictur- 
esque spot  on  the  trail  was  only  the  beginning.  This 
was  useless  unless  the  light  was  right  and  a  satisfac- 
tory place  to  set  up  the  tripod  was  available.  When 
this  latter  was  found,  more  often  than  not  a  tree  or 
two  had  to  be  felled  to  open  up  the  view  to  the  trail. 
Then — as  the  party  photographed  had  to  be  complete 
each  time,  and  with  nothing  to  suggest  the  presence  of 
the  movie  camera  or  its  operator — Koos'  saddle  horse 
and  the  animal  carrying  his  outfit  had  to  be  shuttled 
along  out  of  line  and  tied  up  where  they  would  not  get 
in  the  picture.  This  was  always  a  ticklish  operation  on 
the  narrow  trails,  and  once  or  twice  the  sheer  impos- 
sibility of  segregating  the  superfluous  animals  caused 
Roos  to  forego  extremely  effective  shots. 

The  mountains  became  higher  and  higher,  and 
steeper  and  steeper,  the  farther  we  fared.    And  the 


UP  HORSE  THIEF  CREEK  43 

greater  the  inclines,  the  more  and  more  precarious 
was  the  hold  of  the  winter's  snow  upon  the  mountain- 
sides. At  last  we  climbed  into  a  veritable  zone  of 
avalanches — a  stretch  where,  for  a  number  of  miles, 
the  deep-gouged  troughs  of  the  snow-slides  followed 
each  other  like  the  gullies  in  a  rain-washed  mud- 
bank.  Slide-time  was  in  the  Spring,  of  course,  so  the 
only  trouble  we  encountered  was  in  passing  over  the 
terribly  violated  mountainsides.  If  the  trail  came  to 
the  track  of  an  avalanche  far  up  on  the  mountainside, 
it  meant  descending  a  cut-bank  to  the  scoured  bed- 
rock, click-clacking  along  over  this  with  the  shod 
hooves  of  the  horses  striking  sparks  at  every  step  for 
a  hundred  yards  or  more,  and  then  climbing  out  again. 
If  the  path  of  the  destroyer  was  encountered  low 
down,  near  the  river,  the  way  onward  led  over  a  fifty- 
feet-high  pile  of  upended  trees,  boulders  and  sand. 
In  nearly  every  instance  one  could  see  where  the 
slides  had  dammed  the  stream  a  hundred  feet  high  or 
more,  and  here  and  there  were  visible  swaths  cut  in 
the  timber  of  the  further  side,  where  the  buffer  of 
the  opposite  mountain  had  served  to  check  the  onrush. 
The  going  for  the  horses  was  hard  at  all  times,  but 
worst  perhaps  where  the  dam  of  a  slide  had  checked 
the  natural  drainage  and  formed  a  bottomless  bog  too 
large  for  the  trail  to  avoid.  Here  the  hard-blown 
animals  floundered  belly  deep  in  mud  and  rotten 
wood,  as  did  also  their  riders  when  they  had  to  slide 
from  the  saddles  to  give  their  mounts  a  chance  to  reach 
a  solid  footing.  The  polished  granite  of  the  runways 
of  the  slide  was  almost  as  bad,  for  here  the  horses 
were  repeatedly  down  from  slipping.    My  air-tread- 


44  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

ing,  toe-dancing  "Grayback"  of  the  morning  was 
gone  in  the  back  and  legs  long  before  we  reached  the 
end.  My  weight  and  the  pace  (Nixon  was  driving 
hard  to  reach  a  camping  place  before  a  fresh  gather- 
ing of  storm  clouds  were  ready  to  break)  had  proved 
too  much  for  him.  The  fighting  light  was  gone  from 
his  eye,  his  head  was  between  his  legs,  and  his  breath 
was  expelled  with  a  force  that  seemed  to  be  scouring 
the  lining  from  his  bleeding  nostrils.  Dropping  back 
to  slacken  his  girths  and  breathe  him  a  moment  before 
leading  him  up  the  last  long  run  of  zigzags,  I  heard 
the  sobbing  diminuendo  of  the  pack-train  die  out  in 
the  sombre  depths  above.  It  was  like  the  shudder  of 
sounds  that  rise  through  a  blow-hole  where  the  sea 
waves  are  pounding  hard  on  the  mouth  of  a  subter- 
ranean grotto. 

I  had  developed  a  warm  and  inclusive  sympathy  for 
"Grayback"  before  I  reached  the  crest  of  that  final 
shoulder  of  mountain  we  had  to  surmount,  but  lost 
most  of  it  on  the  slide  back  to  the  valley  when,  in  lieu 
of  an}i:hing  else  to  hand  as  he  found  himself  slipping, 
he  started  to  canter  up  my  spine.  I  found  Nixon  and 
Jim  throwing  off  packs  on  a  narrow  strip  of  moss- 
covered  bottom  between  the  drop-curtain  of  the  fir- 
covered  mountainside  and  the  bank  of  the  creek.  It 
was  practically  the  only  place  for  a  camp  anywhere 
in  the  closely-walled  valley.  Slide-wreckage  claimed 
all  the  rest  of  it.  An  upward  trickle  of  lilac  smoke  a 
half  mile  above  told  where  Harmon's  outfit  had  ef- 
fected some  sort  of  lodgment,  but  it  was  on  a  geesly 
slither  of  wet  side-hill,  Nixon  said,  and  badly  exposed 


UP  HORSE  THIEF  CREEK  45 

to  the  wind  that  was  always  sucking  down  from  the 
glacier. 

The  moss  underfoot  was  saturated  with  water,  but 
with  an  hour  of  daylight  and  pines  close  at  hand  this 
was  a  matter  of  small  moment.  We  were  well  under 
cover  bj^  the  time  the  snuffer  of  the  darkness  clapped 
sharply  down,  and  with  a  good  day's  supply  of  wood 
for  stove  and  camp-fire  piled  up  outside  the  tent. 
Not  having  stopped  for  lunch  on  the  trail,  we  were 
all  rather  "peckish"  (to  use  Nixon's  expression)  by 
the  time  dinner  was  ready.  After  that  there  was 
nothing  much  to  bother  about.  Nixon  told  goat  hunt- 
ing stories  all  evening,  putting  a  fresh  edge  on  his  axe 
the  while  with  a  little  round  pocket  whetstone.  A 
Canadian  guide  is  as  cranky  about  his  private  and 
personal  axe  as  a  Chicago  clothing  drummer  is  about 
his  razors.  So  it  was  only  to  be  expected  that  Nixon 
took  it  a  bit  hard  when  Roos  had  employed  his  keenly 
whetted  implement  to  crack  open  a  hunk  of  quartz 
with.  That  was  the  reason,  doubtless,  why  most  of  his 
stories  had  to  do  with  the  fool  escapades  of  various  of 
the  gee  sly  (that  was  Nixon's  favourite  term  of  con- 
tempt, and  a  very  expressive  one  it  was)  tenderfeet 
he  had  guided.  But  one  of  his  yarns  (and  I  think  a 
true  one)  was  of  a  time  that  he  was  caught  by  a  storm 
at  ten  thousand  feet  in  the  R  ockies  and  had  to  spend 
the  night  on  the  rocks  a  mile  above  the  timber-line. 
Lightly  dressed  and  without  a  blanket,  the  only  pro- 
tection he  had  from  a  temperature  many  degrees  be- 
low freezing  was  from  the  carcasses  of  the  two  freshly- 
shot  goats  that  had  lured  him  there.    Splitting  these 


46  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

down  the  middle  with  his  hunting  knife,  he  had  cov- 
ered himself  with  them,  entrails  and  all,  in  the  hope 
that  the  remaining  animal  heat  would  keep  him  alive 
till  daylight.  Man  and  goat  were  frozen  to  one  stiff 
mass  by  morning,  but  the  man  had  still  enough  vital- 
ity to  crack  himself  loose  and  descend  to  his  camp. 
The  exposure  and  hardship  some  of  these  northwest 
mountaineers  have  survived  is  almost  beyond  belief. 

I  went  to  sleep  with  the  sizzle  of  snowflakes  on  the 
dying  embers  of  the  camp-fire  in  my  ears,  and  awoke 
to  find  the  tent  roof  sagging  down  on  my  ear  under 
the  weight  of  a  heavy  night's  fall.  The  storm  was 
over  for  the  moment,  but  the  clouds  were  still  lurking 
ominously  above  the  glacier,  and  there  was  little  light 
for  pictures.  Harmon,  crossing  the  several  channels 
of  the  creek  on  fallen  logs,  came  over  later  in  the  day. 
He  had  been  stormbound  ever  since  his  arrival,  he  said, 
and  had  done  nothing  at  all  in  taking  either  stills  or 
movies  yet.  But  fires  and  smoke  were  finished  for  the 
year  now,  he  added  philosophically,  and  it  was  his  in- 
tention to  remain  until  he  got  what  he  was  after. 
Before  he  left  he  told  me  something  of  his  work. 
"Stills,"  it  appeared,  were  the  main  thing  with  him; 
his  movie  work  was  carried  on  merely  as  a  side-line  to 
pay  the  expenses  of  trips  he  could  not  otherwise  af- 
ford. He  had  been  photographing  in  the  Selkirks 
and  Rockies  for  a  dozen  years,  and  he  would  not  be 
content  to  rest  until  the  sets  of  negatives — as  nearly 
perfect  as  they  could  be  made — of  every  notable  peak 
and  valley  of  western  Canada.  Then  he  was  going  to 
hold  a  grand  exhibition  of  mountain  photographs  at 
Banff  and  retire.     The  Lake  of  the  Hanging  Gla- 


UP  HORSE  THIEF  CREEK  47 

ciers  was  one  of  the  very  few  great  scenic  features  he 
had  never  photographed,  and  he  only  hoped  he  would 
be  able  to  do  it  justice.  The  fine  reverence  of  Har- 
mon's attitude  toward  the  mountains  that  he  loved 
was  completely  beyond  Roos'  ken.  "I  never  worries 
about  not  doing  'em  justice — not  for  a  minute.  What 
does  worry  me  is  whether  or  not  these  cracked  up  lakes 
and  glaciers  are  going  to  turn  out  worth  my  coming 
in  to  do  justice  to.  Get  me?"  "Yes,  I  think  so,"  re- 
plied the  veteran  with  a  very  patient  smile. 


CHAPTER  III 

AT    THE    GLACIER 

Snow  flurries  kept  us  close  to  camp  all  that  day. 
The  next  one,  the  sixteenth,  was  better,  though 
still  quite  hopeless  for  movie  work.  After  lunch  we 
set  out  on  foot  for  the  big  glacier,  a  mile  above,  from 
which  the  creek  took  its  life.  The  clouds  still  hung 
too  low  to  allow  anything  of  the  mountains  to  be  seen, 
but  one  had  the  feeling  of  moving  in  a  long  narrow 
tunnel  through  which  a  cold  jet  of  air  was  constantly 
being  forced.  A  few  hundred  yards  above  our  camp 
was  a  frightful  zone  of  riven  trees  mixed  with  gravel 
and  boulders.  It  was  one  of  the  strangest,  one  of  the 
savagest  spots  I  ever  saw.  It  was  the  battle  ground 
of  two  rival  avalanches,  Nixon  explained,  two  great 
slides  which,  with  the  impetus  of  six  or  eight  thousand 
feet  of  run  driving  uncounted  millions  of  tons  of  snow 
and  earth,  met  there  every  spring  in  primeval  combat. 
'No  man  had  ever  seen  the  fantastic  onslaught  (for 
no  man  could  reach  that  point  in  the  springtime) ,  but 
it  was  certain  that  the  remains  of  it  made  a  mighty 
dam  all  the  way  across  the  valley.  Then  the  creek 
would  be  backed  up  half  way  to  the  glacier,  when  it 
would  accumulate  enough  power  to  sweep  the  obstruc- 
tion away  and  scatter  it  down  to  the  Columbia. 

Straight  down  the  respective  paths  of  the  rival 
slides,  and  almost  exactly  opposite  each  other,  tumbled 
two  splendid  cascades.     The  hovering  storm  clouds 

48 


AT  THE  GLACIER  49 

cut  off  further  view  of  them  a  few  hundred  feet  above 
the  valley,  but  Nixon  said  that  they  came  plunging 
like  that  for  thousands  of  feet,  from  far  up  into  the 
belt  of  perpetual  snow.  The  one  to  the  east  (which 
at  the  moment  seemed  to  be  leaping  straight  out  of 
the  heart  of  a  sinister  slaty-purple  patch  of  cumulo- 
nimbus) drained  the  Lake  of  the  Hanging  Glaciers; 
that  to  the  west  a  desolate  rock  and  ice-walled  valley 
which  was  rimmed  by  some  of  the  highest  summits  in 
the  Selkirks.  Our  road  to  the  lake  would  be  wet  with 
the  spray  of  the  former  for  a  good  part  of  the  distance. 

We  were  scrambling  through  a  land  of  snow-slides 
all  the  way  to  the  glacier.  For  the  first  half  mile 
patches  of  stunted  fir  survived  here  and  there, 
due  to  being  located  in  the  lee  of  some  cliff  or 
other  rocky  outcrop  which  served  to  deflect  the  spring- 
time onslaughts  from  above;  then  all  vegetation 
ceased  and  nothing  but  snow-churned  and  ice-ground 
rock  fragments  remained.  All  along  the  last  quarter 
of  a  mile  the  successive  stages  of  the  glacier's  retreat 
were  marked  by  great  heaps  of  pulverized  rock,  like 
the  tailings  at  the  mouth  of  a  mine.  Only  the  face 
of  the  glacier  and  the  yawning  ice  caves  were  visible 
under  the  cloud-pall.  The  queerly  humped  uplift  of 
the  "dragon"  moraine  could  be  dimly  guessed  in  the 
shifting  mists  that  whirled  and  eddied  in  the  icy 
draughts  from  the  caves. 

Our  principal  object  in  going  up  to  the  grottoes  on 
so  inclement  a  day  was  to  experiment  with  our  dyna- 
mite on  the  ice,  with  a  view  to  turning  our  knowledge 
to  practical  use  in  making  artificial  icebergs  for  the 
movies  in  the  Lake  of  the  Hanging  Glaciers.     Se- 


50  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

lecting  wliat  looked  like  a  favourable  spot  at  the  base 
of  what  seemed  a  "fracturable"  pinnacle  of  grey- 
green  ice,  we  dug  a  three-feet-deep  hole  with  a  long- 
handled  chisel,  pushed  in  two  sticks  of  sixty  per  cent, 
dj^namite,  tamped  it  hard  with  snow  after  attaching 
a  lengthy  fuse,  touched  a  match  to  the  latter  and  re- 
tired to  a  safe  distance.  The  result,  to  put  it  in  lloos' 
latest  imported  slang,  was  an  "oil  can,"  which  con- 
notes about  the  same  thing  as  fizzle,  I  took  it.  There's 
a  deal  of  kick  in  two  sticks  of  "sixty  per"  set  off  in 
rock,  but  here  it  was  simply  an  exuberant  "whouf" 
after  the  manner  of  a  blowing  porpoise.  A  jet  of  soft 
snow  and  ice  shot  up  some  distance,  but  the  pinnacle 
never  trembled.  And  the  hole  opened  up  was  smooth- 
sided  and  clean,  as  if  melted  out  with  hot  water.  Not 
the  beginning  of  a  crack  radiated  from  it.  Jim 
opined  that  a  slower  burning  powder  might  crack  ice, 
but  there  was  certainly  no  hope  of  "sixty  per"  doing 
the  trick.  It  was  evident  that  we  would  have  to  find 
some  other  way  of  making  artificial  icebergs.  We 
did.  We  made  them  of  rock.  But  I  won't  anticipate. 
It  snowed  again  in  the  night,  snowed  itself  out  for  a 
while.  The  following  morning  it  was  warm  and  bril- 
liantly clear,  and  for  the  first  time  there  was  a  chance 
to  see  what  sort  of  a  place  it  was  to  which  we  had  en- 
tered. For  a  space  the  height  and  abruptness  of  the 
encompassing  walls  seemed  almost  appalling;  it  was 
more  like  looking  up  out  of  an  immeasurably  vast 
crater  than  from  a  valley.  All  around  there  were 
thousands  of  feet  of  sheer  rocky  cliff  upon  which  no 
snow  could  effect  a  lodgment;  and  above  these  more 
thousands  of  feet  soHd  with  the  glittering  green  of 


AT  THE  GLACIER  51 

glacial  ice  and  the  polished  marble  of  eternal  snow. 
The  jagged  patch  of  sky  was  a  vivid  imperiill  blue, 
bright  and  solid-looking  like  a  fragment  of  rich  old 
porcelain.  The  morning  sun,  cutting  through  the 
sharp  notches  between  the  southeastern  peaks,  was 
dappling  the  snow  fields  of  the  western  walls  in  gay 
splashes  of  flaming  rose  and  saffron,  interspersed 
with  mottled  shadows  of  indigo  and  deep  purple. 
Reflected  back  to  the  still  shadowed  slopes  of  the 
eastern  walls,  these  bolder  colours  became  a  blended 
iridescence  of  amethyst,  lemon  and  pale  misty  laven- 
der. The  creek  flowed  steely  cold,  with  fluffs  of  grey- 
wool  on  the  riffles.  The  tree  patches  were  black,  dead 
funereal  black,  throwing  back  no  ray  of  light  from 
their  down-swooping  branches.  The  air  was  so  clear 
that  it  seemed  almost  to  have  assumed  a  palpability  of 
its  own.  One  imagined  things  floating  in  it ;  even  that 
it  might  tinkle  to  the  snip  of  a  finger  nail,  like  a  crys- 
tal rim. 

In  movies  as  in  hay-making,  one  has  to  step  lively 
while  the  sun  shines.  This  was  the  first  good  shooting 
light  we  had  had,  and  no  time  was  lost  in  taking  ad- 
vantage of  it.  Long  before  the  sun  had  reached  the 
bottom  of  the  valley  we  were  picking  our  way  up 
toward  the  foot  of  the  glacier,  this  time  on  horseback. 
Early  as  we  had  started,  the  enterprising  Harmon  had 
been  still  earlier.  He  was  finishing  his  shots  of  the 
face  of  the  glacier  and  the  mouth  of  the  ice  caves  as 
we  came  up.  He  would  now  leave  the  field  clear  for 
Roos  for  an  hour,  he  said,  while  he  climbed  to  the 
cliffs  above  the  glacier  to  make  a  goat-hunting  picture. 
That  finished,  he  would  return  and,  by  the  light  of  his 


52  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

flares  both  parties  could  shoot  the  interior  of  the  ice 
caves.  Before  starting  on  his  long  climb,  Harmon 
briefly  outlined  the  scenario  of  his  "goat"  picture, 
part  of  which  had  already  been  shot.  Two  prospec- 
tors— impersonated  by  his  guide  and  packer — hav- 
ing been  in  the  mountains  for  many  weeks  without  a 
cliange  of  diet,  had  become  terribly  sick  of  bacon. 
Finally,  when  one  of  tliem  had  disgustedly  thrown 
his  plate  of  it  on  the  ground,  even  the  camp  dog,  after 
a  contemptuous  sniff,  had  turned  his  back.  He  had 
had  no  trouble  in  getting  the  men  to  register  "dis- 
gust," Harmon  explained,  but  that  "contemptuous 
sniff"  business  with  the  dog  was  more  difficult.  After 
their  voracious  Airedale  pup  had  wolfed  three  plates 
of  bacon  without  paying  the  least  heed  to  the  director's 
attempts  to  frighten  him  off  at  the  psychological  mo- 
ment, they  had  tried  thin  strips  of  birch-bark,  trimmed 
to  represent  curling  rashers.  Even  these  the  hungry 
canine  had  persisted  in  licking,  probably  because  they 
came  from  a  greasy  plate.  Finally  Harmon  hit  upon 
the  expedient  of  anointing  the  birch-bark  rashers  with 
some  of  the  iodine  carried  as  an  antiseptic  in  the  event 
of  cuts  and  scratches.  "If  the  pup  ate  it,  of  course  it 
would  die,"  he  explained;  "but  that  would  be  no  more 
than  he  deserved  in  such  a  case."  But  the  plan  worked 
perfectly.  After  his  first  eager  lick,  the  outraged 
canine  had  "sniffed  contemptuously"  at  the  pungent 
fumes  of  the  iodine,  and  then  backed  out  of  the  pic- 
ture with  a  wolfish  snarl  on  his  lifted  lip. 

Then  the  packer  registered  "fresh  meat  hunger" 
("cut-in"  of  a  butcher  shop  to  be  made  later),  imme- 
diately after  which  the  guide  pointed  to  the  cliffs 


AT  THE  GLACIER  53 

above  the  camp  where  some  wild  goats  were  frisking. 
By  the  aid  of  his  long-distance  lens,  Harmon  had  shot 
the  goats  as  they  would  appear  through  the  binoculars 
the  guide  and  packers  excitedly  passed  back  and  forth 
between  them.  And  now  they  were  going  forth  to 
shoot  the  goats.  Or  rather  they  were  going  forth  to 
"shoot"  the  goats,  for  these  had  already  been  shot 
with  a  rifle.  In  order  to  avoid  loss  of  time  in  packing 
his  cumbersome  apparatus  about  over  the  cliffs,  Har- 
mon had  sent  out  Conrad,  his  Swiss  guide,  the  pre- 
vious afternoon,  with  orders  to  shoot  a  goat — as  fine  a 
specimen  as  possible — and  leave  it  in  some  picturesque 
spot  where  a  re-shooting  could  be  "shot"  with  the 
camera  when  the  clouds  lifted.  The  keen-eyed  Tyro- 
lese  had  experienced  little  difficulty  in  bringing  down 
two  goats.  One  of  these — a  huge  "Billy" — he  had 
left  at  the  brink  of  a  cliff  a  couple  of  thousand  feet 
above  the  big  glacier,  and  the  other — a  half -grown 
kid — he  had  brought  into  camp  to  cut  up  for  the 
"meat-guzzling"  shots  with  which  guide,  packer  and 
canine  were  to  indulge  in  as  a  finale.  It  was  a  clev- 
erly conceived  "nature"  picture,  one  with  a  distinct 
"educational"  value;  or  at  least  it  was  such  when 
viewed  from  "behind  the  camera."  Roos  was  plainly 
jealous  over  it,  but,  as  he  had  no  goats  of  his  own,  and 
as  Harmon's  goat  was  hardly  likely  to  be  "borrow- 
able"  after  bouncing  on  rock  pinnacles  for  a  thousand 
feet,  there  was  nothing  to  do  about  it.  He  would  have 
to  make  up  by  putting  it  over  Harmon  on  his  "glacier 
stuff,"  he  said  philosophically.  And  he  did;  though  it 
was  only  through  the  virtuosity  of  his  chief  actor. 
Harmon  had  confined  his  glacier  shots  to  one  of  his 


54  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

party  riding  up  over  the  rocks,  and  another  of  it 
grouped  at  the  entrance  of  the  hirgcst  cave  and  look- 
ing in.  Being  an  old  mountaineer,  he  was  disinclined 
to  take  any  unnecessary  chances  in  stirring  up  a  racket 
under  hanging  ice.  Roos  was  new  to  the  mountains, 
so  didn't  lahour  under  any  such  handicap.  His  idea 
was  to  bring  the  whole  outfit  right  up  the  middle  of  the 
stream  and  on  into  the  cave.  The  approach  and  the 
entrance  into  the  mouth  of  the  cave  were  to  be  shot 
first  from  the  outside,  and  then,  in  silhouette,  from  the 
inside. 

Nixon,  pointing  out  that  the  roof  of  the  cave  had 
settled  two  or  three  feet  since  we  were  there  yesterday 
and  that  the  heat  seemed  to  be  honeycombing  all  the 
lower  end  of  the  glacier  pretty  badly,  said  that  he 
didn't  like  the  idea  of  taking  horses  inside,  but  would 
do  so  if  it  would  make  a  better  picture  that  way.  He 
was  quite  willing  to  take  chances  if  there  was  any 
reason  for  it.  But  what  he  did  object  to  was  trying 
to  take  the  horses  up  the  middle  of  the  stream  over  big 
boulders  when  it  would  be  perfectly  plain  to  any  one 
who  saw  the  picture  that  there  was  comparatively 
smooth  going  on  either  side.  "You  can  easy  break  a 
hawss'  leg  in  one  of  them  geesly  holes,"  he  com- 
plained ;  "but  the  loss  of  a  hawss  isn't  a  patch  to  what 
I'd  feel  to  have  some  guy  that  I've  worked  with  see  the 
pictur'  and  think  I  picked  that  sluiceway  as  the  best 
way  up." 

Roos  replied  with  a  rush  of  technical  argument  in 
which  there  was  much  about  "continuity"  and  "back- 
lighting," and  something  about  using  the  "trick  crank 
so  that  the  action  qan  be  speeded  up  when  it's  run." 


AT  THE  GLACIER  55 

Not  knowing  the  answer  to  any  of  this,  Nixon  finally 
shrugged  his  shoulders  helplessly  and  signalled  for 
Jim  to  bring  up  the  horses.  There  was  no  need  of  a 
"trick  crank"  to  speed  up  the  action  in  the  stream,  for 
that  glacial  torrent,  a  veritable  cascade,  had  carried 
away  everything  in  its  course  save  boulders  four  or 
five  feet  high.  Nixon,  in  a  bit  of  a  temper,  hit  the 
ditch  as  though  he  were  riding  a  steeplechase.  So  did 
Jim  and  Gordon.  All  three  of  them  floundered 
through  without  mishap.  "Grayback"  tried  to  climb 
up  on  the  tip  of  a  submerged  boulder,  slipped  with  all 
four  feet  at  once  and  went  over  sidewise.  I  kicked 
out  my  stirrups,  but  hit  the  water  head  first,  getting 
considerably  rolled  and  more  than  considerably  wet. 
To  Roos'  great  indignation,  this  occurred  just  outside 
the  picture,  but  he  had  the  delicacy  not  to  ask  me  to 
do  it  over  again. 

Taking  the  horses  inside  the  cave  was  a  distmctly 
ticklish  performance,  though  there  could  be  no  ques- 
tion of  its  effectiveness  as  a  picture.  Roos  set  up  a 
hundred  feet  in  from  the  fifty-feet-wide,  twenty -feet- 
high  mouth  and  directed  us  to  ride  forward  ujitil  a 
broad  splashing  jet  of  water  from  the  roof  blocked 
our  way,  and  then  swing  round  and  beat  it  out.  'Beat 
it  out  snappy!"  he  repeated.  "Get  me?"  "Yep,  I  got 
you,"  muttered  Nixon;  "you're  in  luck  if  nothin'  else 
does." 

The  ice  that  arched  above  the  entrance  looked  ^to  me 
like  the  salt-eaten  packing  round  an  ice-cream  can  as 
we  pushed  up  and  under  it.  The  horses  could  hardly 
have  noticed  this,  and  it  must  have  been  their  insliincts 
— their  good  sound  horse-sense — that  warned  them 


56  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

that  a  dark  hole  full  of  hollow  crackings  and  groanings 
and  the  roar  of  falling  water  was  no  place  for  self-re- 
specting equines  to  venture.  It  took  a  deal  of  spur- 
ring and  swearing  to  force  them  inside,  and  most  of 
the  linear  distance  gained  was  covered  in  circles  on 
their  hind  legs.  It  was  old  "Grayback"  whose  nerves 
gave  way  first;  he  that  started  the  stampede  back  to 
light  and  sunshine.  There  was  no  question  but  what 
we  "beat  it  snappy." 

Roos  came  out  rubbing  his  hands  gleefully.  "That 
photographed  like  a  million  dollars,"  he  cried  with 
enthusiasm.  "Now  just  one  thing  more.  .  .  ." 
And  forthwith  he  revealed  what  had  been  in  his  heart 
ever  since  he  chanced  onto  that  "natural  shower  bath" 
in  the  cave  the  previous  afternoon.  No  one  could  deny 
that  it  was  a  natural  shower  bath.  And  since  it  was 
a  natural  shower  bath,  what  could  be  more  natural 
than  for  some  one  to  take  a  shower  under  it?  How 
would  Nixon  feel  about  trying  it?  Or  Jim?  He  ad- 
mitted that  it  might  be  something  of  a  shock,  but  he 
was  willing  to  make  that  all  right.  Would  ten  dollars 
be  fair?  Or  say  twenty?  Or  why  not  twenty-five? 
He  knew  Mr.  Chester  didn't  reckon  cost  when  it  w^as 
a  question  of  getting  a  high  class,  he  might  say  a 
unique,  picture.  Now  which  should  it  be?  Nixon,  a 
bit  snappily,  said  his  rheumatism  put  him  out  of  the 
running,  and  Jim  was  equally  decided.  Money 
wouldn't  tempt  him  to  go  even  into  the  Columbia  at 
Windermere,  let  alone  a  liquid  icicle  under  a  glacier. 

And  right  then  and  there  I  did  a  thing  which  Roos 
maintained  to  the  end  of  our  partnership  repaid  him 
for  all  the  grief  and  worry  I  had  caused  him  to  date. 


AT  THE  GLACIER  57 

and  much  that  was  still  to  accrue.  "Since  I've  got 
to  take  a  bath  and  dry  these  wet  togs  out  sooner  or 
later,"  I  said  with  a  great  assumption  of  nonchalance, 
"perhaps  the  ice  cave  will  do  as  well  as  anywhere  else. 
Just  promise  me  you  won't  spring  a  flare  on  the  scene, 
and  build  a  fire  to  dry  my  clothes  by.  ..."  Roos 
was  gathering  wood  for  a  fire  before  I  finished  speak- 
ing. As  for  the  flares,  Harmon  had  not  given  him 
any  yet.  It  was  only  a  silhouette  he  wanted — but 
that  would  show  up  like  a  million  dollars  in  the  spray 
and  ice.  There  never  had  been  such  a  picture;  per- 
haps would  never  be  again.  I  wasn't  joking,  was  I? 
And  primitive   .    .    . 

"Go  on  and  set  up,"  I  cut  in  with.  "I'll  be  there 
by  the  time  you're  ready  to  shoot.  And  don't  ever 
let  me  hear  you  say  primitive  again.  Oh,  yes — and 
you  needn't  remind  me  to  'Be  snappy !'  There  won't 
be  any  trouble  on  that  score.  Just  make  sure  your 
lens  is  fast  enough  to  catch  the  action." 

I've  had  many  a  plunge  overboard  off  the  Cali- 
fornia coast  that  shocked  me  more  than  that  "natural 
shower  bath"  did,  but  never  a  one  with  so  exhilarant 
a  reaction.  Stripping  off  my  wet  clothes  by  the  fire, 
I  slipped  into  my  big  hooded  "lammy"  coat  and  hip- 
pity-hopped  into  the  cave.  Roos,  set  up  ten  yards 
inside  the  splashing  jet  from  the  roof,  was  already 
standing  by  to  shoot.  At  his  call  of  "Action!"  I 
jumped  out  of  my  coat  and  into  the  black,  unsparkling 
column  of  water.  There  was  a  sharp  sting  to  the  im- 
pact, but  it  imparted  nothing  of  the  numbing  ache 
that  accompanies  immersion  in  water  a  number  of 
degrees  less  cold  than  this — a  feeling  which  I  came 


58  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

later  to  know  only  too  well  on  the  Columbia.  Nixon 
had  warned  me  against  tempting  Providence  again 
by  making  any  unnecessary  racket  in  the  cave,  but  it 
was  no  use.  No  one  could  have  the  fun  that  I  was 
having  and  not  holler.  It  was  against  nature. 
Whooping  like  a  Comanche,  I  continued  my  hydro- 
terpsichorean  revel  until  a  muffled  "Nuff"  from  Roos 
called  a  halt.  He  had  come  to  the  end  of  his  roll. 
I  have  been  in  more  of  a  shiver  coming  out  of  the 
Adriatic  at  the  Lido  in  August  than  I  was  when  I 
ambled  back  to  dry  off  by  the  fire  and  the  sunshine. 
Glowing  with  warmth,  I  even  loafed  along  with  my 
dressing,  as  one  does  at  Waikiki. 

"You'd  make  a  fortune  pulling  the  rough  stuff  in 
the  movies,"  Roos  exclaimed,  patting  me  on  the  back. 
"You've  got  everything  the  real  gripping  cave-man 
has  to  have — size,  beef,  a  suggestion  of  brutal,  ele- 
mental force,  primitive.  ..."  I  chucked  a  burn- 
ing brand  at  him  and  went  over  to  borrow  Nixon's 
glass.  A  shot  from  far  up  the  cliffs  told  that  Har- 
mon's "goat-hunt"  was  in  full  cry.  The  real  thrill 
of  the  day  was  about  to  come  off;  rather  more  of  a 
thrill,  indeed,  than  any  one  was  prepared  for,  Harmon 
included. 

While  we  liad  been  filming  our  "cave  stuff"  Har- 
mon had  finished  setting  the  stage  for  his  picture. 
He  had  two  shots  to  make — one  of  his  packers  firing 
at  the  goat  at  the  top  of  the  cliff,  and  the  other  of 
the  body  of  the  goat  falling  to  the  glacier.  Conrad, 
the  Tj^rolean,  climbing  like  a  fly,  had  scaled  the  face 
of  the  cliff  and  was  standing  by  for  the  signal  to  start 
the  goat  "falling."    The  shot  which  had  attracted  my 


ROSS  AND  HARMON.      DRAGON   MORAINE  IN  DISTANCE    (above) 
THE  HORSES  IN  THE  MOUTH  OF  THE  ICE  CAVE    (heloiv) 


AT  THE  GLACIER  59 

attention  had  been  the  packer  discharging  his  rifle 
at  the  goat,  which  had  been  propped  up  in  a  hfe-hke 
position,  as  though  peering  down  onto  the  glacier. 
Harmon  was  still  cranking  when  I  got  him  in  focus, 
while  the  packer  had  jumped  to  his  feet  and  was 
executing  a  pas  seul  evidently  intended  to  convey  the 
impression  he  had  made  a  hit.  A  curl  of  blue  smoke 
from  his  rifle  was  still  floating  in  the  air.  They  had 
contrived  that  effective  little  touch  by  dribbling  a  bit 
of  melted  butter  down  the  barrel  before  firing. 
Smokeless  powder  is  hardly  "tell-tale"  enough  for 
movie  work. 

Harmon  now  moved  over  and  set  up  at  the  foot  of 
the  cliff,  apparently  to  get  as  near  as  possible  to  the 
point  where  the  goat  was  going  to  hit.  As  the  sequel 
proves,  he  judged  his  position  to  a  hair.  Now  he  made 
his  signal.  I  saw  the  flutter  of  his  handkerchief.  The 
goat  gave  a  convulsive  leap,  and  then  shot  straight  out 
over  the  brink  of  the  cliff.  From  where  we  stood  I 
could  plainly  see  the  useful  Conrad  "pulling  the 
strings,"  but  from  where  Harmon  was  set  up  this 
would  hardly  show.  He  was  too  careful  to  overlook  a 
point  like  that  in  a  "nature  picture."  The  white  body 
caromed  sharply  off  a  couple  of  projecting  ledges, 
and  then,  gathering  momentum,  began  to  describe  a 
great  parabola  which  promised  to  carry  it  right  to  the 
foot  of  the  cliff. 

I  had  kept  my  eyes  glued  to  the  glass  from  the 
start,  but  it  was  Nixon's  unaided  vision  which  was 
first  to  catch  the  drift  of  what  was  impending.  "You 
couldn't  drive  a  six-hawss  team  'tween  the  side  o' 
Mista  Ha'mon's  head  and  the  trail  in  the  air  that 


60  DOWN  THE  COLUISIBIA 

gecsJy  goat's  going  to  make  passing  by,"  he  said  with 
a  calculating  drawl.  "Not  so  su'  you  could  squeeze  a 
pack-hawss  through."  Then,  a  couple  of  seconds 
later:  "No'  ev'n  a  big  dawg."  And  almost  immedi- 
ately:    "By  Gawd,  it's  going  to  get  him!" 

And  that  surely  was  what  it  looked  like,  to  every 
one  at  least  but  the  calmly  cranking  Harmon.  He 
went  on  humping  his  back  above  the  finder,  and  I 
could  see  the  even  rise  and  fall  of  his  elbow  against 
the  snow.  The  dot  of  white  had  become  a  streak  of 
grey,  and  it  was  the  swift  augmentation  of  this  in 
his  finder  which  finally  (as  he  told  me  later)  caused 
Harmon  suddenly  to  duck.  To  me  it  looked  as  if 
the  flying  streak  had  passed  right  through  him,  but  he 
was  still  there  at  the  foot  of  his  tripod  after  the  Bolt 
of  Wrath,  striking  the  surface  of  the  glacier  with  a 
resounding  impact,  threw  up  a  fountain  of  pulverized 
snow  and  laid  still.  He  was  never  quite  sure  whether 
it  was  the  almost  solid  cushion  of  air  or  a  side-swipe 
from  a  hoof  or  horn  that  joggled  the  tripod  out  of 
true.  It  was  a  near  squeeze,  for  the  flying  body, 
which  must  have  weighed  all  of  two  hundred  pounds, 
was  frozen  hard  as  a  rock.  Conrad  came  staggering 
down  with  the  remnants  of  the  battered  trunk  over  his 
shoulders.  Only  the  heart  and  liver  were  fit  to  eat. 
The  rest  was  a  sausage  of  churned  meat  and  bone 
splinters.  There  was  no  question  about  its  fall  hav- 
ing limbered  it  up. 

The  illumination  of  the  cave  by  the  calcium  flares 
was  beautiful  beyond  words  to  describe,  or  at  least  so 
I  was  told.  The  first  one  was  a  failure,  through  the 
outward  draught  of  air  carrying  the  smoke  back  onto 


AT  THE  GLACIER  61 

the  cameras.  I  had  set  this  off  in  a  side  gallery,  about 
a  hundred  yards  in  from  the  mouth,  with  the  idea  of 
throwing  a  sort  of  concealed  back  light.  Foolishly 
opening  my  eyes  while  the  calcium  was  burning,  I  was 
completely  blinded  by  the  intense  glare  and  did  not 
regain  my  sight  for  several  minutes.  Harmon's 
packer,  who  held  the  next  flare  set  off — this  time  to 
the  leeward  of  the  cameras — had  still  worse  luck.  A 
flake  of  the  sputtering  calcium  kicked  back  up  his 
sleeve  and  inflicted  a  raw,  round  burn  with  half  the 
colours  of  the  spectrum  showing  in  its  concentric  rings 
of  singed  cuticle.  The  chap  displayed  astonishing 
nerve  in  refusing  to  relinquish  his  grip  on  the  handle 
of  the  flare  and  thus  ruin  the  picture.  I  most  cer- 
tainly would  never  have  done  so  myself.  Roos  de- 
scribed the  glittering  ice  walls  as  a  "veritable 
Aladdin's  Cave  of  jewels,"  and  only  regretted  that  he 
couldn't  have  had  that  lighting  on  my  shower-bath. 

That  night  we  tried  a  camp-fire  scene  by  flare. 
Roos  set  up  on  the  further  bank  of  the  side  channel 
of  the  creek  which  flowed  past  the  tent.  Between  the 
door  of  the  tent  and  the  water  a  hole  was  dug  in  such 
a  way  that  light  from  it  would  shine  on  a  group  in 
front  of  the  tent  but  not  on  the  lens  of  the  camera. 
The  glow  from  a  flare  burning  in  this  hole  represented 
the  camp-fire.  I  was  supposed  to  stroll  up  and  tell 
a  jovial  story  to  Nixon,  Jim  and  Gordon,  who  were 
to  be  "picked  up"  already  seated  around  the  fire.  I 
made  my  entrance  very  snappily,  but,  unluckily,  the 
blanket  roll  upon  which  I  sat  down  spread  out  and 
let  me  back  against  the  corner  of  the  glowing  sheet- 
iron  stove,  which  was  set  up  just  inside  the  tent  open- 


62  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

ing.  Seeing  I  had  not  rolled  out  of  the  picture,  Roos 
shouted  for  me  to  carry  on,  as  it  was  the  last  flare. 
So,  with  the  reek  of  burning  wool  rising  behind  me, 
I  did  carry  on,  making  ^^lausible  gestures  intended 
to  convey  the  idea  that  the  bit  of  comedy  was  just  a 
humorous  piece  of  by-play  of  my  own.  I  carried  on 
for  something  over  half  a  minute.  The  only  circmii- 
stance  that  prevented  my  carrying  on  my  back  the 
print  of  the  corner  of  the  stove  for  the  rest  of  my 
days  was  the  fact  that  the  combined  thicknesses  of  my 
duffle  coat,  lumberman's  shirt,  sweater  and  heavy 
woollen  undershirt  were  interposed  to  absorb  the  heat. 
The  duffle  coat  was  the  worst  sufferer,  coming  out 
with  a  bar-sinister  branded  most  of  the  way  through 
its  half  inch  of  pressed  brown  wool. 


CHAPTER  IV 

THE    LAKE    OF    THE    HANGING    GLACIERS 

It  was  now  neck-or-nothing  with  the  Lake  of  the 
Hanging  Glaciers  picture.  Having  ah'eady  been  out 
much  longer  than  we  had  expected  to  be,  there  were 
left  only  provisions  for  two  days.  Nixon  had  sug- 
gested making  a  hurried  trip  out  and  bringing  in  fresh 
supplies,  but  as  the  time  set  by  Chester  for  his  arrival 
for  the  Big  Bend  trip  was  already  past,  I  did  not 
feel  warranted  in  prolonging  the  present  jaunt  any 
further.  If  the  morrow  was  fair  all  would  be  well; 
if  not,  the  main  object  of  our  trip  would  be  defeated. 

By  great  good  luck  the  clear  weather  held.  There 
was  not  a  cloud  hovering  above  the  mountains  at  day- 
break the  following  morning,  and  we  got  away  for 
an  early  start  to  make  the  most  of  our  opportunity. 
Nixon  himself  had  run  and  cut  out  the  trail  to  the 
Lake  earlier  in  the  summer,  but  horses  had  never  been 
taken  over  it.  Though  it  was  extremely  steep  in 
pitches,  our  maiden  passage  was  marked  with  few 
difficulties.  Much  to  Nixon's  surprise  and  satisfac- 
tion, only  one  big  deadfall  had  been  thrown  down  to 
block  the  way,  and  our  enforced  halt  here  gave  Roos 
the  opportunity  for  a  very  effective  "trail  shot."  He 
also  got  some  striking  "back-lighting  stuff"  at  spots 
along  the  interminable  cascade  that  was  tumbling  and 
bounding  beside  the  trail.  The  elevation  of  our  camp 
on  the  creek  was  something  like  six  thousand  feet,  and 

63 


64  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

that  of  the  Lake  of  the  Hanging  Glaciers  a  bit  under 
eight  thousand.  The  trail  is  between  three  and  four 
miles  long,  and  we  were  rather  over  two  hours  in  mak- 
ing the  climb.  There  were  several  halts  out  of  this; 
steady  plugging  would  do  it  much  quicker. 

Timber-line  was  passed  half  a  mile  below  the  lake, 
the  last  of  the  trees  being  left  behind  in  a  wonderful 
little  mountain  park  studded  with  gnarled  pines  and 
still  bright  with  late  wild  flowers.  The  autumn 
colouring  here  was  a  marvellous  chromatic  revel  in 
dull  golds  and  soft,  subdued  browns — the  shedding 
tamaracks  and  the  dying  meadow  grasses. 

Clambering  on  foot  up  a  steep-sided  hillock  that 
appeared  to  be  an  ancient  glacial  moraine  augmented 
by  many  slides,  we  suddenly  found  ourselves  on  the 
edge  of  the  high-water  level  of  the  lake.  The  transi- 
tion from  the  flower-strewn  meadow  to  a  region  of 
almost  Arctic  frigidit}^  was  practically  instantaneous 
— the  matter  of  a  half  dozen  steps.  One  moment  we 
were  climbing  in  a  cliff-walled  valley,  with  rocky 
buttresses  and  pinnacles  soaring  for  thousands  of  feet 
on  either  side,  and  with  brown-black  gravel  and  thin- 
ning brown-grey  bunch  grass  under  foot  and  ahead; 
the  next,  as  we  gained  the  crest  of  the  old  terminal 
moraine,  the  landscape  opened  up  with  a  blinding 
flash  and  we  were  gazing  at  a  sparkling  emerald  lake 
clipped  in  the  embrace  of  an  amphitheatre  of  glaciers 
and  eternal  snow,  and  floating  full  of  icebergs  and 
marble-mottled  shadows.  The  "Hanging  Glacier" — 
perhaps  a  mile  wide  across  its  face,  and  rearing  a 
solid  wall  of  ice  a  couple  of  hundred  feet  in  the  sheer 
— closed  the  further  or  southeastern  end  of  the  lake. 


LAKE  OF  HANGING  GLACIERS       65 

Behind  the  glacier  was  a  cliff  of  two  thousand  feet  or 
more  in  height.  It  appeared  to  be  almost  solid  ice 
and  snow,  but  must  have  been  heavily  underlaid  with 
native  rock  to  maintain  its  abruptness  as  it  did. 
Higher  still  a  snow-cap,  bright  and  smooth  as  pol- 
ished marble,  extended  to  the  crest  of  the  range  and 
formed  a  glittering  line  against  the  cobalt  of  the  sky. 
Of  all  the  scenic  gems  of  the  North  American  con- 
tinent, I  recall  none  which  is  so  well  entitled  to  the 
characterization  of  "unique"  as  this  white-flaming 
little  jewel  of  the  high  Selkirks. 

The  lake  was  now  rapidly  receding  to  its  winter 
low-water  level,  and  to  reach  its  brink  we  had  to 
press  on  across  three  hundred  yards  of  black  boulders 
which  were  evidently  covered  in  the  time  of  the  late 
spring  floods.  Ordinarily  one  would  have  expected 
the  worst  kind  of  rough  and  slippery  walking  here, 
but,  to  my  great  surprise,  the  great  rocks  were  set  as 
solid  and  as  level  as  a  pavement  of  mosaic.  The  rea- 
son for  this  became  plain  when  we  approached  the 
water,  where  a  flotilla  of  small  icebergs,  rising  and 
falling  to  the  waves  kicked  up  by  the  brisk  breeze 
drawing  down  the  lake,  were  steadily  thump-thump- 
ing the  bottom  with  dull  heavy  blows  which  could  be 
felt  underfoot  a  hundred  yards  away.  This  natural 
tamping,  going  on  incessantly  during  the  riionths  of 
high-water,  was  responsible  for  the  surprising  smooth- 
ness of  the  rocky  waste  uncovered  by  the  winter  re- 
cession. The  great  boulders  had  literally  been  ham- 
mered flat. 

The  icebergs,  which  were  formed  by  the  cracking 
off  of  the  face  of  the  gi*eat  glacier  filled  half  of  the 


66  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

lake.  They  varied  in  size  from  almost  totally  sub- 
merged chunks  a  few  feet  in  diameter  to  huge  floating 
islands  of  several  hundred.  They  were  of  the  most 
fantastic  shapes,  especially  those  which  had  been 
longest  adrift  and  therefore  most  exposed  to  the  ca- 
pricious action  of  the  sim.  By  and  large,  tlie  effect 
was  that  of  a  Gargantuan  bowl  sprinkled  with  puffy 
white  popcorn.  But  if  one  took  his  time  and  searched 
carefully  enough  there  were  very  few  things  of  heaven 
or  earth  that  were  not  represented  in  the  amazing 
collection.  One  berg,  floating  on  another,  had  been 
reduced  by  the  sun  to  the  seeming  of  a  gigantic  view 
camera — box,  bellows  and  lens.  A  number  of  famous 
groups  of  statuary  were  there,  but  of  course  very 
much  in  the  rough.  "The  Thinker"  was  perhaps  the 
best  of  these,  but  even  Rodin  would  have  wanted  to 
do  a  bit  more  "finishing"  on  the  glacial  cave-man 
humped  up  on  his  icy  green  pedestal.  Boos,  who  had 
never  heard  of  Rodin,  said  it  reminded  him  of  me 
drying  out  after  my  shower-bath  in  the  ice-cave.  His 
facile  imagination  also  discovered  something  else.  He 
had  once  seen  a  picture  of  "Lohengrin's  Farewell" 
in  a  Victrola  record  price-list,  and  there  was  a  much 
sun-licked  hunk  of  ice,  very  near  the  shore,  which  sug- 
gested the  barge  to  him,  swans  and  all.  I  saw  the 
barge  all  right,  but  the  Pegasus  of  my  imagination 
had  to  have  some  spurring  before  he  would  take  the 
"swan"  hurdle. 

It  was  Roos'  idea  that  I  should  swim  off,  clamber 
over  the  side  of  the  barge,  lassoo  the  "near"  swan 
with  a  piece  of  pack-rope  to  represent  reins,  and  let 
him  shoot  me  as  "Lohengrin."     It  wouldn't  exactly 


u 


LAKE  OF  HANGING  GLACIERS       67 

run  into  the  "continuity"  of  the  "sportsman"  picture, 
he  admitted;  but  he  thought  that  Chester  might  use 
it,  with  a  lot  of  other  odds  and  ends,  under  some  such 
title  as  "Queer  People  in  Queer  Places."  The  idea 
appealed  to  me  strongly.  "Lohengrin's  Farewell"  had 
always  moved  me  strangely;  and  here  was  a  chance 
actually  to  appear  in  the  classic  role!  "You  bet  I'll 
do  it,"  I  assented  readily.  "What  shall  I  wear?" 
The  "Shining  Armour,"  which  we  both  seemed  to 
connect  with  "Lohengrin,"  happened  to  be  one  of  the 
things  not  brought  up  in  our  saddle-bags  that  morn- 
ing. We  were  in  a  hot  discussion  as  to  the  best  manner 
of  improvising  a  helmet  and  cuirass  out  of  condensed 
milk  and  sardine  tins,  when  Nixon,  asking  if  we  knew 
that  the  sun  only  shone  about  three  hours  a  day  in 
that  ''geesly  crack  in  the  hills,"  dryly  opined  that  we 
should  take  our  pictures  of  the  lake  while  there  was 
plenty  of  light.  That  sounded  sensible,  and  we 
started  feverishly  to  hurry  through  with  the  routine 
grind  so  as  to  be  free  to  do  proper  justice  to  "Lohen- 
grin." As  Fate  would  have  it,  however,  that  which 
was  presently  revealed  to  me  of  the  ways  of  fresh- 
water icebergs  quenched  effectually  my  desire  to  swim 
off  and  take  liberties  with  the  capricious  things  at 
close  quarters. 

After  making  a  number  of  scenic  shots,  Roos  an- 
nounced that  he  was  ready  to  go  ahead  with  the  "fall- 
ing iceberg"  stuff.  As  it  was  quite  out  of  the  question 
making  our  way  along  the  base  of  the  cliffs  on  either 
side  of  the  lake  to  the  face  of  the  glacier  in  the  limited 
time  at  our  disposal,  and,  moreover,  as  we  had  already 
demonstrated  the  impossibility  of  making  artificial 


68  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

icebergs  with  "sixty  per"  dynamite,  it  became  neces- 
sary to  improvise  something  closer  at  hand.  It  was 
Roos'  idea  that  a  piece  of  chff  cracked  off  into  the 
lake  might  produce  the  effect  desired,  especially  if 
"cut"  with  discrimination.  "Here's  the  way  it  goes," 
he  explained.  "The  cracked  off  rock  plunks  down 
into  the  lake  right  into  the  middle  of  a  bunch  of  float- 
ing icebergs.  I  starts  cranking  at  the  splash,  ahd 
with  the  bergs  all  rolling  about  and  bumping  into 
each  other  no  one  can  tell  but  what  it  was  one  of  them 
that  really  started  it.  Then  I'll  pick  you  up  hopping 
up  and  down  on  the  bank  and  registering  'surprise' 
and  'consternation';  and  then  follow  with  a  close-up 
of  you  standing  on  that  high  rock,  looking  down  on 
the  quieting  waves  with  folded  arms.  Now  you  reg- 
ister 'relief  and  finally  a  sort  of  'awed  wonder.'  Then 
you  take  a  big  breath  and  raise  your  eyes  to  the  face 
of  the  glacier.  You  keep  right  on  registering  'awed 
wonder'  (only  more  intense)  and  as  I  fade  you  out  you 
shake  your  head  slowly  as  if  the  mighty  mysteries  of 
Nature  were  beyond  your  understanding.  Get  me? 
They  ought  to  colour  the  film  for  that  dark  blue  in  the 
laboratory  (I  could  tell  'em  just  the  solution  to  make 
that  ice  look  cold),  and  the  sub-title  ought  to  be  'The 
Birth  of  an  Iceberg,'  and   ..." 

"Jim's  the  midwife,  is  he?"  I  cut  in.  "Yes,  I  get 
you.  Tell  him  to  uncork  some  of  that  'sixty  per'  'Twi- 
light Sleep'  of  his  and  I'll  stand  by  for  the  chris- 
tening." 

After  a  careful  technical  examination  of  the  terrain, 
Jim,  chief  "Powder  Monkey,"  located  what  he 
thought  was  a  favourable  spot  for  operations  and 


LAKE  OF  HANGING  GLACIERS       69 

started  to  enlarge  a  thin  crack  in  the  cliff  to  make  it 
take  five  sticks  of  dynamite.  That  was  more  than 
half  of  our  remaining  stock;  but  Roos  was  insisting 
on  a  big  iceberg,  and  plenty  of  powder  was  the  best 
way  to  insure  success.  It  must  have  been  the  tamping 
that  was  at  the  bottom  of  the  trouble,  for  moss  and 
damp  earth  are  hardly  solid  enough  to  deflect  the 
kick  of  the  dynamite  in  the  desired  direction.  At  any 
rate,  although  there  was  a  roaring  detonation,  the 
mighty  force  released  was  expended  outward  rather 
than  inward.  The  face  of  the  cliff  hardly  shivered, 
and  only  an  inconsiderable  trickle  of  broken  rocks 
and  sand  slid  down  into  the  lake.  Too  sore  to  take 
more  than  hostile  notice  of  Nixon's  somewhat  rough 
and  ready  little  mot  about  the  "  'Birth  o'  the  Iceberg' 
turning  out  a  geesly  miscarriage,"  Roos  clapped  the 
cap  over  his  lens,  unscrewed  the  crank  and  began 
taking  his  camera  off  its  tripod.  That  rather  hasty 
action  was  responsible  for  his  missing  by  a  hair  what 
I  am  certain  was  the  greatest  opportunity  ever  pre- 
sented to  a  moving  picture  operator  to  film  one  of  the 
most  stupendous  of  Nature's  manifestations. 

The  roar  of  the  detonating  dynamite  reverberated 
for  half  a  minute  or  more  among  the  cliffs  and  peaks,, 
and  it  was  just  after  the  last  roll  had  died  out  that 
a  renewed  rumble  caused  me  to  direct  a  searching  gaze 
to  the  great  wall  of  ice  and  snow  that  towered  above 
the  farther  end  of  the  lake.  For  an  instant  I  could 
not  believe  my  eyes.  It  could  not  be  possible  that  the 
whole  mountainside  was  toppling  over !  And  yet  that 
was  decidedly  the  effect  at  a  first  glance.  From  the 
rim  of  the  snow-cap  down  to  the  back  of  the  glacier — 


70  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

a  mile  wide  and  two  thousand  feet  high — there  was 
one  solid,  unbroken  Niagara  of  glittering,  coruscant 
ice  and  snow.  Like  a  curtain  strung  with  diamonds 
and  pearls  and  opals  it  streamed,  while  the  shower  of 
flaming  colours  was  reflected  in  the  quivering  waters 
of  the  lake  in  fluttering  scarves  of  sun-shot  scarlet,  in 
tenuous  ribbons  of  lavender,  jade  and  primrose.  It 
was  only  when  the  last  shreds  of  this  marvellous 
banner  had  ceased  to  stream  (at  the  end  of  thirty  or 
forty  seconds  perhaps)  that  I  saw  what  it  was  that  had 
caused  it.  The  whole  hair-poised  brink  of  the  great 
snow-cap — sharply  jolted,  doubtless,  by  the  explosion 
of  the  dynamite — had  cracked  away  and  precipitated 
itself  to  the  glacier  level,  nearly  half  a  mile  below. 
The  shock  to  the  latter  appeared  to  have  had  the  effect 
of  jarring  it  sufficiently  to  crack  down  great  blocks 
all  along  its  face.  The  glacier  had,  in  fact,  been 
shocked  into  giving  birth  to  a  whole  litter  of  real  ice- 
bergs where,  nearer  at  hand,  we  had  failed  dismally 
in  our  efforts  to  incubate  even  an  artificial  one.  As 
glacial  obstetricians  it  appeared  that  we  still  had 
much  to  learn. 

Roos  made  a  great  effort  to  get  his  camera  set  up 
again  in  time  to  make  it  record  something  of  the  won- 
derful spectacle.  He  was  just  too  late,  however. 
Only  a  few  thin  trickles  of  snow  were  streaking  the 
face  of  the  cliff  when  he  finally  swung  his  powerful 
tele-photo  lens  upon  it,  and  even  these  had  ceased  be- 
fore he  had  found  his  focus.  It  was  no  end  of  a  pity. 
I  saw  several  of  the  great  valangas  started  by  the 
Austrian  and  Italian  artillery  in  the  Dolomites,  and, 
previous  to  that,  what  I  had  thought  were  very  con- 


LAKE  OF  HANGING  GLACIERS      71 

siderable  slides  on  Aconcagua  and  Chimborazi,  in  the 
Andes,  and  on  Kinchin junga  and  among  the  hanging 
ice-fields  above  the  Zoji-la  in  the  Himalayas.  But 
any  half  dozen  of  the  greatest  of  these  would  have 
been  lost  in  that  mighty  avalanche  of  ice  and  snow 
that  we  saw  descend  above  the  Lake  of  the  Hanging 
Glaciers.  Nixon,  with  a  lifetime  spent  in  the  Selkirks 
and  Rockies,  said  he  had  never  seen  anything  to  com- 
pare with  it. 

Jim,  reporting  that  he  still  had  three  sticks  of  dyna- 
mite in  hand,  said  he  reckoned  there  might  be  a  better 
chance  of  starting  an  "iceberg"  on  the  southern  side 
of  the  lake  than  on  the  northern  one,  where  we  had 
failed  to  accomplish  anything.  The  southern  slope 
was  even  more  precipitous  than  the  northern,  he 
pointed  out,  and  he  had  his  eye  on  a  rock  which  looked 
as  if  a  charge  might  turn  it  over  and  start  it  rolling. 
"You  never  can  tell  what  you  may  be  startin'  among 
a  bunch  o'  tiltin'  rocks  like  them  'uns,"  he  said  hope- 
fully. Nixon's  muttered  "That  ain't  no  geesly  hooch 
dream"  might  have  meant  several  things;  but  I  took 
it  that  he  intended  to  imply  that  there  was  too  much 
"unstable  equilibrium"  along  that  southern  shore  to 
make  it  the  sort  of  a  place  that  a  neurasthenic  would 
seek  out  for  a  rest  cure.  I  felt  the  same  way  about  it, 
only  more  so;  but  Roos'  disappointment  over  what 
he  had  already  missed  was  so  keen  that  neither  of  us 
had  the  heart  to  interpose  any  objections  when  he  told 
Jim  to  go  ahead  and  see  what  he  could  do.  As  two 
sticks  of  dynamite  were  already  promised  to  Harmon, 
the  trick,  if  it  came  off,  would  have  to  be  pulled  with 
one.    Spitting  tobacco  juice  on  the  taffy-uKe  cylinder 


72  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

for  luck,  Jim  clambered  off  up  the  cliff  and  planted 
it  under  his  "likely  rock,"  Roos  meantime  setting  up 
in  a  favourable  position  below. 

Whether  Jim's  "tobaccanalian  libation"  had  any- 
thing to  do  with  it  or  not,  this  time  luck  was  with  us. 
The  sharp  blast  kicked  Jim's  rock  up  on  one  ear, 
where  it  teetered  for  a  second  or  two  indecisively  be- 
fore rolling  over  sidewise  and  coming  down  kerplump 
on  a  huge  twenty-ton  cube  of  basalt  that  no  one  would 
have  thought  of  moving  with  a  barrel  of  giant.  It 
wasn't  so  much  what  the  little  rock  did  as  the  way  it 
did  it.  The  big  block  gave  a  sort  of  a  quiver,  much 
as  a  man  awakening  from  a  doze  would  stretch  his 
arms  and  yawn,  and  when  it  quivered  a  lot  of  loose 
stuff  slipped  away  from  beneath  and  just  let  it  go. 
It  lumbered  along  at  an  easy  roll  for  a  bit,  and  then 
increased  its  speed  and  started  jumping.  Its  first 
jump  was  no  more  than  a  nervous  little  hop  that 
served  to  hurdle  it  clear  of  a  length  of  flat  ledge  that 
reached  out  to  stop  its  downward  progress.  A  second 
later  it  had  hit  its  stride,  so  that  when  it  struck  the 
water  there  had  been  nothing  but  rarefied  air  trying 
to  stop  it  for  two  hundred  feet.  Down  it  went,  push- 
ing a  column  of  compressed  aqua  jnira  ahead  of  it 
and  sucking  a  big  black  hole  along  in  its  wake.  It 
was  when  that  column  of  compressed  water  spouted 
up  again  and  tried  to  chase  its  tail  down  the  hole  it 
had  come  out  of  that  things  began  to  happen,  for  it 
found  something  like  a  dozen  fat  icebergs  crowding 
in  and  trying  to  insinuate  their  translucent  bulks  into 
the  same  opening.  And  of  course  they  made  a  tre- 
mendous fuss  about  it.    When  an  iceberg  found  that 


Courtesy  of  Byron  Harmon,  Banff 

THE  FACE  OF  THE   HANGING  GLACIER 


o 
w 

O 

W 

U 

K 

H 

z  ^ 

o  oi 


w 
u 

a 

=     O 

i   >^ 

2   >^ 
■_    w 

C      OS 


o 


LAKE  OF  HANGING  GLACIERS       73 

it  couldn't  get  in  standing  up,  it  forthwith  lay  down 
on  its  side,  or  even  rolled  over  on  its  back ;  which  didn't 
help  it  in  the  least  after  all,  for  the  very  good  reason 
that  all  the  other  icebergs  were  adopting  the  same 
tactics.  And  so  Roos,  who  was  cranking  steadily  all 
the  time,  got  his  "Birth  of  an  Iceberg"  picture  after 
all. 

When  the  bergs  ceased  butting  their  heads  off 
against  each  other  Roos  shot  me  in  the  scenes  where  I 
registered  "consternation,"  "relief"  and  "awed  won- 
der," and  our  hard-striven-for  Lake  of  the  Hanging 
Glaciers  picture  was  complete.  There  was  just  a  bit 
of  a  hitch  at  the  "awed  wonder"  fade-out,  though,  but 
that  was  Roos'  fault  in  trying  to  introduce  a  "human 
touch"  by  trying  to  make  Gordon's  dog  perch  up  be- 
side me  on  the  crest  of  a  hatchet-edged  rock.  The 
pup  sat  quietly  wagging  his  tail  until  the  moment 
came  for  me  to  lift  up  mine  eyes  unto  the  hills  and 
increase  the  tenseness  of  my  "awed  wonder"  registra- 
tion. Then  the  altitude  began  to  affect  his  nerves  and 
he  started  doing  figure  "8's"  back  and  forth  between 
my  precariously  planted  feet.  As  a  natural  conse- 
quence, when  Roos  started  in  on  his  "fade-out"  I  was 
seesawing  my  arms  wildly  to  maintain  my  balance, 
talking  volubly,  and  registering — well,  what  would  a 
temperamental  movie  star  be  registering  while  in  the 
act  of  telling  a  dog  and  a  man  what  he  thought  of 
them  for  their  joint  responsibility  in  all  but  pitching 
him  off  a  twenty-foot-high  rock  into  a  vortex  of  tum- 
bling icebergs?  Again  (unless  this  part  of  the  film 
has  been  discreetly  cut  in  the  studio  before  exhibition) 
I  beg  the  indulgence  of  lip-readers. 


74  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

The  lake  was  deeply  shadowed  before  we  were 
finally  at  liberty  to  take  up  again  the  sartorics  of 
"Lohengrin";  but  it  was  not  that  fact,  nor  yet  the  not 
entirely  prohibitive  difficulty  of  making  shining 
armour  out  of  tin  cans,  that  nipped  that  classic  con- 
ception in  the  bud.  Rather  it  was  the  astonishing 
unstable-mindedness  displayed  by  the  bergs  when  im- 
pinged upon  from  without.  Of  the  hundred  or  more 
hunks  of  floating  ice  within  a  five-hundred-yard  radius 
of  the  point  where  our  artificial  berg  had  hit  the  water, 
only  a  half  dozen  or  so  of  the  broadest  and  flattest 
continued  to  expose  the  same  profiles  they  had  pre- 
sented before  the  big  splash.  Most  of  the  others  had 
turned  over  and  over  repeatedly,  and  one,  which 
seemed  to  "hang"  in  almost  perfect  balance,  continued 
slowly  revolving  like  a  patent  churn.  "Lohengrin's 
Barge,"  half  a  mile  distant  from  the  heart  of  the 
"birth  splash"  and  lapped  by  but  the  lightest  of  ex- 
piring waves,  was  rolling  drunkenly  to  port  and  star- 
board as  though  in  the  trough  of  the  seas  of  a  typhoon. 
It  looked  ready  to  turn  turtle  at  a  touch,  and  there 
were  too  many  angular  projections  on  it — especially 
about  the  "swans" — to  make  even  a  man  who  aspired 
to  grand  opera  care  to  court  lightly  the  experience  of 
tangling  himself  up  In  the  wreck. 

Descending  to  the  timber-line  meadow  where  the 
horses  had  been  left,  we  found  Harmon  had  brought 
up  his  outfit  and  pitched  his  tent  midway  of  an  en- 
chanting vista  framed  in  green-black  pines  and  golden 
tamaracks,  and  with  a  wonderful  background  for 
"camp  shots"  botli  up  and  down  the  valley.  There  he 
was  going  to  make  his  base,  he  said,  until  he  found 


LAKE  OF  HANGING  GLACIERS      75 

just  the  light  he  wanted  on  the  Lake  of  the  Hanging 
Glaciers.  Then  he  hoped  to  get  at  least  a  negative 
or  two  that  would  do  something  approaching  justice 
to  so  inspiring  a  subject.  And  there,  working  and 
waiting  patiently  through  an  almost  unbroken  succes- 
sion of  storms  that  raged  in  the  high  Selkirks  for  many- 
days,  he  held  on  until  he  got  what  he  wanted.  It  was 
in  that  quiet  persistent  way  that  \fe  had  been  photo- 
graphing the  mountains  of  the  Canadian  West  for 
many  years,  and  it  will  be  in  that  way  that  he  will 
continue  until  he  shall  have  attained  somewhere  near 
to  the  high  goal  he  has  set  for  his  life's  work — a  com- 
plete photographic  record  of  the  Rockies  and  Sel- 
kirks. It  is  a  privilege  to  have  met  an  artist  who 
works  with  so  fine  a  spirit,  who  has  set  himself  so 
high  an  ideal.  A  number  of  Harmon's  scenic  pictures 
of  the  mountains  where  the  Columbia  takes  its  rise  are 
so  much  better  than  the  best  of  my  own  of  the  same 
subjects,  that  I  am  giving  them  place  in  a  work  which 
it  was  my  original  intention  to  illustrate  entirely  my- 
self. 

We  returned  to  our  camp  at  the  head  of  Horse 
Thief  Creek  that  night,  and  set  out  on  our  return 
to  Windermere  the  following  morning.  Save  for  a 
rather  sloppy  passage  of  the  main  ford,  the  journey 
was  without  incident.  With  light  packs,  we  pushed 
right  through  to  the  head  of  the  wagon-road — some- 
thing over  thirty  miles — the  first  day.  The  seventeen 
miles  to  Invermere  we  covered  in  a  leisurely  fashion, 
reaching  the  hotel  at  three  in  the  afternoon  of  the  fol- 
lowing day,  Sunday,  the  twentieth  of  September. 
Here  I  found  a  wire  from  Chester,  stating  that  it  had 


7G  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

finally  proved  impossible  for  him  to  get  away  from 
business,  and  asking  me  to  go  ahead  and  see  the  Big 
Bend  trip  through  without  him.  In  the  event  I  de- 
cided to  continue  on  down  the  river  he  would  be  glad 
to  have  his  cameraman  accompany  me  as  long  as  the 
weather  and  light  were  favourable  for  his  work.  A 
letter  with  full  instructions  covering  the  two  pictures 
he  desired  made  had  already  been  dispatched. 


CHAPTER  V 

CANAL.    FLATS    TO    BEAVERMOUTH 

Chester's  instructions  respecting  the  two  new  pic- 
tures he  wanted  us  to  work  on  came  through  to  Roos 
the  day  following  our  return  to  Windermere.  One  of 
these  was  to  be  confined  entirely  to  the  Big  Bend 
voyage.  Essaying  again  my  role  of  "gentleman-cum- 
sportsman,"  I  was  to  get  off  the  train  at  Beavermouth, 
meet  my  boatman,  launch  the  boat  and  start  off  down 
the  river.  The  various  things  seen  and  done  en 
voyage  were  to  make  up  the  picture. 

In  the  other  picture  I  w^as  to  play  the  part  of  a 
young  rancher  who  was  farming  his  hard-won  clear- 
ing on  the  banks  of  the  Columbia  near  its  source. 
With  the  last  of  his  crops  in,  he  is  assailed  one  day 
with  a  great  longing  to  see  the  ocean.  Suddenly  it 
occurs  to  him  that  the  river  flowing  right  by  his  door 
runs  all  the  way  to  the  sea,  and  the  sight  of  a  pros- 
pector friend,  about  to  push  off  with  a  sack  of  samples 
for  the  smelter  many  hundreds  of  miles  below,  sug- 
gests a  means  of  making  the  journey.  And  so  the 
two  of  them  start  off  down  the  Columbia.  What  hap- 
pened to  them  on  their  way  was  to  be  told  in  the  pic- 
ture. The  introductory  scenes  of  this  picture  were 
to  be  made  somewhere  in  the  vicinity  of  Windermere, 
but  the  thread  of  the  story  was  to  be  picked  up  below 
the  Arrow  Lakes  after  the  Big  Bend  voyage  was 
over. 

Hunting  "location"  and  rainy  weather  kept  us  four 

77 


78  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

or  five  days  in  Windermere  and  vicinity,  giving  an 
opportunity  we  otherwise  would  have  missed  to  meet 
and  become  acquainted  with  the  always  kindly  and 
hospitable  and  often  highly  distinguished  people  of 
this  beautiful  and  interesting  community.  From  the 
time  of  David  Thompson,  the  great  astronomer  and 
explorer  of  the  Northwest  Company  who  wintered 
there  in  1810,  down  to  the  present  Windermere  seems 
always  to  have  attracted  the  right  sort  of  people.  The 
predominant  class  is  what  one  might  call  the  gentle- 
man-farmer, with  the  stress  perhaps  on  "gentleman." 
I  mean  to  say,  that  is,  that  while  a  number  of  them 
have  failed  of  outstanding  achievement  as  farmers, 
there  was  none  that  I  met  who  would  not  have  quali- 
fied as  a  gentleman,  and  in  the  very  best  sense  of  the 
word.  Sportsmen  and  lovers  of  the  out-of-doors, 
there  was  this  fine  bond  of  fellowship  between  all  of 
them.  Nowhere  have  I  encountered  a  fresher,  more 
wholesome  social  atmosphere  than  that  of  this  fine 
communit}'^  of  the  upper  Columbia. 

That  genial  and  big-hearted  old  Scot,  Randolph 
Bruce,  I  recall  with  especial  affection,  as  must  every 
one  of  the  many  who  has  known  the  hospitality  of 
his  great  log  lodge  on  a  bay  of  the  lake  below  Inver- 
mere.  An  Edinburgh  engineer,  Bruce  was  one  of 
the  builders  of  the  Canadian  Pacific,  and  as  such  an 
associate  and  intimate  of  Van  Home,  O'Shaughnessy 
and  the  rest  of  those  sturdy  pioneers  who  pushed  to 
accomplishment  the  most  notable  piece  of  railwaj^  con- 
struction the  world  has  ever  known.  In  love  with  the 
West  by  the  time  the  railway  was  finished,  he  built 
him  a  home  in  the  most  beautiful  spot  he  knew — 


CANAL  FLATS  TO  BEAVERMOUTH   79 

such  a  spot  as  few  even  among  the  Scottish  lochs  could 
rival — and  associated  himself  with  various  projects  for 
the  advancement  of  the  country.  At  the  present  time 
he  is  the  owner  of  the  Paradise  mine,  one  of  the  rich- 
est silver-lead  properties  in  British  Columbia,  and  the 
head  of  an  enterprise  which  purposes  to  bring  the 
Windermere  region  to  its  own  among  the  grandest  of 
the  playgrounds  of  North  America. 

We  made  the  preliminary  scenes  for  the  "farmer" 
picture  at  a  gem  of  a  little  mountain  ranch  in  a  clear- 
ing to  the  west  of  Lake  Windermere.  Shooting 
through  one  of  his  favourite  "sylvan  frames,"  Roos 
picked  me  up  violently  shocking  hay  at  the  end  of  a 
long  narrow  field  which  the  labour  of  a  young  Scotch 
immigrant  had  reclaimed  from  the  encompassing  for- 
est. (As  a  matter  of  fact  the  hay  was  already  in 
shocks  when  we  arrived,  and  I  had  to  unshock  a  few 
shocks  so  as  to  shock  them  up  again  before  the  camera 
and  thus  give  the  impression  that  this  was  the  last  of 
my  season's  crop.)  Then  I  threw  up  a  couple  of 
shocks  for  him  set  up  at  closer  range,  with  more  atten- 
tion to  "technique."  (This  latter  came  easy  for  me, 
as  I  had  been  pitching  hay  for  a  fortnight  on  my  Cali- 
fornia ranch  earlier  in  the  summer.)  Finally  I 
stopped  work,  leaned  on  my  fork  and  gazed  into  the 
distance  with  visioning  eyes.  (I  was  supposed  to  be 
thinking  of  the  sea,  Roos  explained,  and  in  the  finished 
picture  there  would  be  a  "cut-in"  of  breakers  at  this 
point.)  Then  I  registered  "impatience"  and  "rest- 
lessness," hardening  to  "firm  resolve."  At  this  junc- 
ture I  threw  down  my  fork  and  strode  purposefully 
out  of  the  right  side  of  the  picture.     (The  cabin  to 


80  DOWN  THE  COLUINIBIA 

which  I  was  supposed  to  be  striding  was  really  on 
my  left,  but  Roos  explained  that  some  sort  of  a  movie 
JNIedian  law  made  it  imperative  alwaj^s  to  exit  to 
right.)  Then  we  went  over  to  make  the  cabin  shots. 
The  owner  of  the  cabin  was  away  at  tlie  moment, 
but  his  young  Scotch  wife — a  bonnie  bit  of  a  lass  who 
might  have  been  the  inspiration  for  "Annie  Laurie" — 
was  on  hand  and  mightily  interested.  She  asked  if  I 
was  Bill  Hart,  and  Roos  made  the  tactical  error  of 
guffawing,  as  though  the  idea  was  absurd.  She  was 
a  good  deal  disappointed  at  that,  but  still  very  ready 
to  help  with  anjiihing  calculated  to  immortalize  her 
wee  home  by  emblazoning  it  on  the  imperishable  cel- 
luloid. First  I  strode  into  the  cabin,  but  almost  im- 
mediately to  emerge  unfolding  a  map.  Going  over 
to  a  convenient  stump,  I  sat  down  and  disposed  of  a 
considerable  footage  of  "intent  study."  Then  we 
made  a  close-up  of  the  map — the  Pacific  Northwest 
— with  my  index  finger  starting  at  Windermere  and 
tracing  the  course  of  the  Columbia  on  its  long  winding 
way  to  the  sea.  That  proved  that  there  was  water 
transit  all  the  way  to  that  previous  cut-in  of  breakers 
which  my  visioning  eyes  had  conjured  up  just  before 
I  threw  down  my  fork.  I  stood  up  and  gazed  at  the 
nearby  river  (which  was  really  Lake  Windermere,  a 
mile  distant),  and  presently  stiffened  to  my  full 
height,  registering  "discovery."  What  I  was  sup- 
posed to  see  was  a  prospector  tinkering  with  his  boat. 
As  this  latter  scene  could  not  be  made  until  we  had 
bought  a  boat  and  signed  up  a  "prospector,"  all  that 
was  left  to  do  here  was  to  shoot  me  striding  away  from 
the  cabin  on  the  way  to  discuss  ways  and  means  with 


OLD  HUDSON  BAY  CART  AT  BEAVERMOUTH    (above) 

MY   FIRST    PUSH-OFF   AT    THE    HEAD   OF   CANOE    NAVIGATION    ON 
THE  COLUMBIA    (belotv) 


M 


w  ■» 
w  o 


«3 


CANAL  FLATS  TO  BEAVERMOUTH   81 

my  mythical  companion,  and  then  striding  back,  get- 
ting my  roll  of  blankets  and  exiting  in  a  final  fade- 
out.  As  we  had  neglected  to  provide  a  roll  of  blankets 
for  this  shot,  we  had  to  improvise  one  from  such  ma- 
terial as  was  available.  I  forget  all  that  went  to  make 
up  that  fearful  and  wonderful  package;  but  it  is  just 
as  well  the  precariously-roped  bundle  didn't  resolve 
into  its  component  parts  until  the  fade-out  was  pretty 
nearly  complete. 

Roos  tried  hard  to  introduce  "human  interest"  and 
"heart  appeal"  by  staging  a  farewell  scene  with  "wife 
and  child,"  both  of  which  were  ready  to  hand.  I  was 
adamant,  however,  even  when  he  agreed  to  compro- 
mise by  leaving  out  the  child.  He  was  rather  stub- 
born about  it,  refusing  to  admit  the  validity  of  my 
argument  to  the  effect  that  a  would-be  screen  hero 
who  deserted  so  fair  a  wife  would  alienate  the  sym- 
pathies of  the  crowd  at  the  outset.  Finally  it  was 
decided  for  us.  "It's  too  late  noo,"  cooed  a  wee  voice 
in  which  I  thought  I  detected  both  reproach  and  re- 
lief; "while  ye're  talkin',  yon  cooms  Jock." 

It  was  too  late  all  right;  even  Roos  was  ready  to 
grant  that.  Jock  was  about  six-feet-three,  and  built 
in  proportion.  Also  a  wee  bitty  dour,  I  thought.  At 
least  he  glowered  redly  under  his  bushy  brows  when 
he  discovered  that  I  had  wrapped  up  his  own  and 
another  niclit-goon  in  my  hastily  assembled  blanket- 
roll.  If  that  bothered  him,  I  hate  to  think  what  might 
have  happened  had  he  surprised  that  farewell  scene, 
especially  as  Roos — with  his  Mack  Sennett  training 
and  D.  W.  Griffith  ideals — ^would  have  tried  to  stage 
it. 


82  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

Roos  was  young  and  experienced,  and  lacking  in 
both  finesse  and  subtlety.  I  granted  that  this  wouldn't 
have  cramped  his  style  much  in  doing  "old  home  town 
stuff;"  but  farther  afield  it  was  electric  with  danger- 
ous possibilities.  Driving  back  to  the  hotel  I  quoted 
to  him  what  Kipling's  hero  in  "The  JNIan  Who  Would 
Be  King"  said  on  the  subject,  paraphrasing  it  slightly 
so  he  would  understand.  "A  man  has  no  business 
shooting  farewell  scenes  with  borrowed  brides  in  for- 
eign parts  be  he  three  times  a  crowned  movie  director," 
was  the  way  I  put  it. 

It  was  my  original  intention  to  start  the  boating 
part  of  my  Columbia  trip  from  Golden,  at  the  head 
of  the  Big  Bend,  the  point  at  which  the  calm  open 
reaches  of  the  upper  river  give  way  to  really  swift 
water.  The  decision  to  make  the  push-off  from  Beav- 
ermouth,  twenty-nine  miles  farther  down,  was  come 
to  merely  because  it  was  much  easier  to  get  the  boat 
into  the  water  at  the  latter  point.  There  was  little 
swift-water  boating  worthy  of  the  name  above  Beaver- 
mouth.  Donald  Canyon  was  about  the  only  rough 
water,  and  even  that,  I  was  assured,  was  not  to  be 
mentioned  in  the  same  breath  with  scores  of  rapids 
farther  down  the  Bend.  In  the  ninety  miles  between 
the  foot  of  Lake  Windermere  and  Golden  there  were 
but  twenty-five  feet  of  fall,  so  that  the  winding  river 
was  hardly  more  than  a  series  of  lagoon-like  reaches, 
with  a  current  of  from  one  to  four  miles  an  hour.  Be- 
tween Columbia  Lake — practically  the  head  of  the 
main  channel  of  the  river — and  Mud  Lake,  and  be- 
tween the  latter  and  the  head  of  Lake  Windermere, 
there  was  a  stream  of  fairly  swift  current,  but  at  this 


CANAL  FLATS  TO  BEAVERMOUTH   83 

time  of  year  not  carrying  enough  water  to  permit  the 
passage  of  even  a  canoe  without  much  hning  and 
portaging. 

From  the  practical  aspect,  therefore,  I  was  quite 
content  with  the  plan  to  start  my  voyage  from  Beaver- 
mouth.  For  the  sake  of  sentiment,  however,  I  did 
want  to  make  some  kind  of  a  push-off  from  the  very 
highest  point  that  offered  sufficient  water  to  float  a 
boat  at  the  end  of  September.  This,  I  was  assured 
in  Invermere,  would  be  Canal  Flats,  just  above  the 
head  of  Columbia  Lake  and  immediately  below 
the  abandoned  locks  which  at  one  time  made  naviga- 
tion possible  between  the  Kootenay  and  the  Columbia, 
Although  these  crude  log-built  locks  have  never  been 
restored  since  they  were  damaged  by  a  great  freshet 
in  the  nineties,  and  although  the  traffic  they  passed 
in  the  few  years  of  their  operation  was  almost 
negligible,  it  may  be  of  interest  to  give  a  brief  de- 
scription of  the  remarkable  terrain  that  made  their 
construction  possible  by  the  simplest  of  engineering 
work,  and  to  tell  how  the  removal  of  a  few  shovelfuls 
of  earth  effected  the  practical  insulation  of  the  whole 
great  range  of  the  Selkirks. 

As  a  consequence  of  recent  geological  study,  it  has 
been  definitely  established  that  the  divide  between  the 
Columbia  and  Kootenay  rivers,  now  at  Canal  Flats, 
was  originally  a  hundred  and  fifty  miles  farther  north, 
or  approximately  where  Donald  Canyon  occurs. 
That  is  to  say,  a  great  wall  of  rock  at  the  latter  point 
backed  up  a  long,  narrow  lake  between  the  Rockies 
on  the  east  and  the  Selkirks  on  the  west.  This  lake, 
unable  to  find  outlet  to  the  north,  had  risen  until  its 


84  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

waters  were  sufficiently  above  the  lower  southern  bar- 
riers to  give  it  drainage  in  that  direction.  At  that 
time  it  was  doubtless  the  main  source  of  the  Kootenay 
River,  and  its  waters  did  not  reach  the  Columbia  until 
after  a  long  and  devious  southerly  course  into  what  is 
now  JNIontana,  thence  northward  into  Kootenay  Lake, 
and  finally,  by  a  dizzy  westerly  plunge,  into  a  much- 
extended  Arrow  Lake.  An  upheaval  which  carried 
away  the  dyke  at  Donald  provided  a  northward  drain- 
age for  the  lake,  and  the  divide  was  ultimately  estab- 
lished at  what  is  now  called  Canal  Flats.  It  was  a 
shifting  and  precarious  division,  however,  for  the 
Kootenay — which  rises  some  distance  to  the  north- 
ward in  the  Rockies  and  is  here  a  sizable  stream — dis- 
charged a  considerable  overflow  to  the  Columbia  basin 
at  high  water.  It  was  this  latter  fact  which  called 
attention  to  the  comparative  ease  with  which  naviga- 
tion could  be  established  between  the  two  rivers  by 
means  of  a  canal.  For  an  account  of  how  this  canal 
came  to  be  built  I  am  indebted  to  E.  INI.  Sandilands, 
Esq.,  Mining  Recorder  for  the  British  Columbia  Gov- 
ernment at  Wilmer,  who  has  the  distinction  of  being, 
to  use  his  own  language,  "the  person  who  made  the 
Selkirk  Mts.  an  Island  by  connecting  the  Columbia 
and  Kootenay  rivers." 

Mr.  Sandilands,  in  a  recent  letter,  tells  how  an  ex- 
big-game  himter  by  the  name  of  Baillie-Grohman  ob- 
tained, in  1880,  a  concession  from  the  Provincial 
Government  of  British  Columbia  for  35,000  acres  of 
land  along  the  Kootenay  River.  In  return  for  this 
he  was  to  construct  at  his  own  expense  a  canal  con- 
necting  the    Columbia    and    Kootenay.      This    cut 


CANAL  FLATS  TO  BEAVERMOUTH   85 

was  for  the  ostensible  purpose  of  opening  up  navi- 
gation between  the  two  streams,  but  as  nothing  was 
stipulated  in  respect  of  dredging  approaches  the 
obligation  of  the  concessionaire  was  limited  to  the 
construction  of  the  canal  and  locks.  "For  this  rea- 
son," writes  Mr.  Sandilands,  who  was  working  on  the 
job  at  the  time,  "our  'Grand  Canal'  was  practically 
useless.  Nevertheless,  in  1888,  it  was  opened  with 
due  form  and  pomp,  engineer,  contractor  and  con- 
cessionaire paddling  up  to  the  lock  in  a  canoe  well 
laden  with  the  'good  cheer'  demanded  by  such  an 
occasion.  I  was  driving  a  team  attached  to  a  'slush- 
scraper,'  and  together  with  a  jovial  Irish  spirit  who 
rejoiced  in  the  name  of  Thomas  Haggerty,  was  or- 
dered by  the  foreman  to  scrape  out  the  false  dam 
holding  the  Kootenay  back  from  the  canal.  This  we 
did  as  long  as  we  dared.  Then  I  was  deputed,  with 
gum-boots  and  shovel,  to  dig  a  hole  through  what  was 
left  of  the  false  dam,  and  allow  the  Kootenay  into 
the  canal  and  the  Columbia.  This  being  done,  the 
fact  was  wired  to  the  Provincial  Government  at  Vic- 
toria .  .  . ,  and  the  promised  concession  of  land  was 
asked  for  and  granted.  I  little  thought  at  the  time," 
Mr.  Sandilands  concludes,  "how  distinguished  a  part 
I  was  playing,  that  I  was  making  the  Selkirk  Moun- 
tains an  'Island,'  a  fact  which  few  people  realize  to 
this  day." 

Later  a  little  dredging  was  done,  so  that  finally,  by 
dint  of  much  "capstaning,"  a  shallow-draught  stern- 
wheeler  was  worked  up  to  and  through  the  lock  and 
canal,  and  on  down  the  Kootenay  to  Jennings,  Mon- 
tana.    It  was  Captain  F.  P.  Armstrong  who  per- 


86  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

formed  this  remarkable  feat,  only  to  lose  the  historic 
little  craft  later  in  one  of  the  treacherous  canyons  of 
the  Kootenay.  Plis  also  was  the  distinction,  after 
maintaining  an  intermittent  service  between  the  Co- 
lumbia and  Kootenay  for  a  number  of  years,  of  being 
the  captain  and  owner  of  the  last  boat  to  make  that 
amazing  passage. 

We  reached  Canal  Flats  at  the  end  of  a  forty-mile 
auto-ride  from  Invermere.  Traces  of  the  old  dredged 
channel  were  still  visible  running  up  from  the  head  of 
Columbia  Lake  and  coming  to  an  abrupt  end  against 
a  caving  wall  of  logs  which  must  at  one  time  have 
been  a  gate  of  the  inter-river  lock.  Out  of  the  tan- 
gle of  maiden  hair  fern  which  draped  the  rotting  logs 
came  a  clear  trickle  of  water,  seeping  through  from 
the  other  side  of  the  divide.  This  was  what  was  popu- 
larly called  the  source  of  the  Columbia.  I  could  just 
manage  to  scoop  the  river  dry  with  a  quick  sweep  of 
my  cupped  palm. 

A  hundred  yards  below  the  source  the  old  channel 
opened  out  into  a  quiet  currentless  pool,  and  here  I 
found  a  half-filled  Peterboro  belonging  to  a  neigh- 
bouring farmer,  which  I  had  engaged  for  the  first  leg 
of  my  voyage  down  the  Columbia.  It  leaked  rather 
faster  than  I  could  bail,  but  even  at  that  it  floated  as 
long  as  there  was  water  to  float  it.  Fifty  yards  far- 
ther down  a  broad  mudbank  blocked  the  channel  all 
the  way  across,  and  in  attempting  to  drag  the  old 
canoe  out  for  the  portage,  I  pulled  it  in  two  amid- 
ships. I  had  made  my  start  from  almost  chock-a- 
block  against  the  source,  however.  Sentiment  was 
satisfied.    I  was  now  ready  for  the  Bend.    Groping 


CANAL  FLATS  TO  BEAVERMOUTH   87 

my  way  back  to  the  car  through  an  almost  impenetra- 
ble pall  of  mosquitoes,  I  rejoined  Roos  and  we  re- 
turned to  Invermere. 

A  wire  from  Blackmore  stating  that  it  would  still 
be  several  days  before  his  boat  was  ready  for  the  Bend 
offered  us  a  chance  to  make  the  journey  to  Golden  by 
river  if  we  so  desired.  There  was  nothing  in  it  on  the 
boating  side,  but  Roos  thought  there  might 
be  a  chance  for  some  effective  scenic  shots.  I, 
also,  was  rather  inclined  to  favour  the  trip,  for  the 
chance  it  would  give  of  hardening  up  my  hands  and 
pulling  muscles  before  tackling  the  Bend.  An  un- 
propitious  coincidence  in  the  matter  of  an  Indian  name 
defeated  the  plan.  Roos  and  I  were  trying  out  on 
Lake  Windermere  a  sweet  little  skiff  which  Randolph 
Bruce  had  kindly  volunteered  to  let  us  have  for  the 
quiet  run  down  to  Golden.  "By  hard  pulling,"  I 
said,  "we  ought  just  about  to  make  Spillimacheen  at 
the  end  of  the  first  day."  "Spill  a  what?"  ejaculated 
Roos  anxiously;  "you  didn't  say  'machine,'  did  you?" 
"Yes;  Spillimacheen,"  I  replied.  "It's  the  name  of  a 
river  that  flows  down  to  the  Columbia  from  the  S el- 
kirks."  "Then  that  settles  it  for  me,"  he  said  deci- 
sively. "I  don't  want  to  spill  my  machine.  It  cost 
fifteen  hundred  dollars.  I'm  not  superstitious;  but, 
just  the  same,  starting  out  for  a  place  with  a  name 
like  that  is  too  much  like  asking  for  trouble  to  suit 
yours  truly."  And  so  we  went  down  to  Golden  by 
train  and  put  in  the  extra  time  outfitting  for  the  Bend. 

Golden,  superbly  situated  where  the  Kicking  Horse 
comes  tumbling  down  to  join  the  Columbia,  is  a  typi- 
cal Western  mining  and  lumbering  town.   Save  for 


88  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

their  penchant  for  dramatizing  the  perils  of  the  Big 
Bend,  the  people  are  delightfnl.  It  is  true  that  the 
hospitable  spirit  of  one  Goldenite  did  get  me  in  rather 
bad;  but  perhaps  the  fault  was  more  mine  than  his. 
Meeting  him  on  the  railway  platform  just  as  he  was 
about  to  leave  for  Vancouver,  he  spoke  with  great  en- 
thusiasm of  his  garden,  and  said  that  he  feared  some  of 
his  fine  strawberries  might  be  going  to  waste  in  his  ab- 
sence for  lack  of  some  one  to  eat  them.  I  gulped  with 
eagerness  at  that,  and  then  told  him  bluntly — and 
truthfully — that  I  would  willingly  steal  to  get  straw- 
berries and  cream,  provided,  of  course,  that  they 
couldn't  be  acquired  in  some  more  conventional  way. 
He  hastened  to  reassure  me,  saying  that  it  wouldn't 
be  necessary  to  go  outside  the  law  in  this  case.  "The 
first  chance  you  get,"  he  said  with  a  twinkle  in  his  eye, 
"just  slip  over  and  make  love  to  my  housekeeper,  and 
tell  her  I  said  to  give  you  your  fill  of  berries  and 
cream,  and  I  have  no  doubt  she'll  provide  for  you." 

If  his  Vancouver-bound  train  had  not  started  to 
pull  out  just  then,  perhaps  he  would  have  explained 
that  that  accursed  "love  stuff"  formula  was  a  figure 
of  speech.  Or  perhaps  he  felt  sure  that  I  would  un- 
derstand it  that  wa}^  if  not  at  once,  at  least  when  the 
time  came.  And  I  would  have,  ordinarily.  But  my 
strawberry-and-cream  appetite  is  so  overpowering 
that,  like  the  lions  at  feeding  time,  my  finer  psycho- 
logical instincts  are  blunted  where  satiation  is  in  sight. 
That  was  why  I  blurted  out  my  hospitable  friend's 
directions  almost  verbatim  when  I  saw  that  the  door 
of  his  home  (to  which  I  had  rushed  at  my  first  oppor- 
tunity) had  been  opened  by  a  female.    It  was  only 


CANAL  FLATS  TO  BEAVERMOUTH   89 

after  I  had  spoken  that  I  saw  that  she  was  lean,  an- 
gular, gimlet-eyed,  and  had  hatred  of  all  malekind 
indelibly  stamped  upon  her  dour  visage.  She  drew 
in  her  breath  whistlingly ;  then  controlled  herself  with 
an  effort.  "I  suppose  I  must  give  you  the  berries  and 
cream,"  she  said  slowly  and  deliberately,  the  clearly 
enunciated  words  falling  icily  like  the  drip  from  the 
glacial  grottoes  at  the  head  of  the  Columbia;  "but  the 
— the  other  matter  you  would  find  a  little  difficult." 

"Ye-es,  ma'am,"  I  quavered  shiveringly,  "I  would. 
If  you'll  please  send  the  strawberries  and  cream  to 
the  hotel  I  am  quite  content  to  have  it  a  cash  transac- 
tion." 

Considering  the  way  that  rapier-thrust  punctured 
me  through  and  through,  I  felt  that  I  deserved  no 
little  credit  for  sticking  to  my  guns  in  the  matter  of 
the  strawberries  and  cream.  For  the  rest,  I  was 
floored.  The  next  time  any  one  tries  to  send  me  into 
the  Hesperides  after  free  fruit  I  am  going  to  know 
who  is  guarding  the  apples;  and  I  am  not  going  to 
approach  the  delectable  garden  by  the  love-path. 

I  had  taken  especial  pains  to  warn  Roos  what  he 
would  have  to  expect  from  Golden  in  the  matter  of 
warnings  about  the  Big  Bend,  but  in  spite  of  all,  that 
garrulous  social  centre,  the  town  poolroom,  did  man- 
age to  slip  one  rather  good  one  over  on  him  before  we 
got  away.  "How  long  does  it  take  to  go  round  the 
Bend?"  he  had  asked  of  a  circle  of  trappers  and 
lumber- jacks  who  were  busily  engaged  in  their  fa- 
vourite winter  indoor-sport  of  decorating  the  pool- 
room stove  with  a  frieze  of  tobacco  juice.  "Figger  it 
fer  yerself,  sonny,"  replied  a  corpulent  woodsman 


90  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

with  a  bandaged  jaw.  "If  yer  gets  inter  yer  boat  an' 
lets  it  go  in  that  ten-twent'-thirt'  mile  current,  it's  a 
simpl'  problum  of  'rithmatick.  If  yer  ain't  dished  in 
a  souse-hole,  yer  has  ter  make  Revelstoke  insider  one 
day.  As  yer  has  ter  do  sum  linin'  to  keep  right  side 
up,  it's  sum  slower.  Best  time  any  of  us  makes  it  in 
is  two  days.  But  we  never  rushes  it  even  like  that 
'nless  we're  hurryin'  the  cor'ner  down  ter  sit  on  sum 
drownded  body." 

As  the  whole  court  had  nodded  solemn  acquiescence 
to  this,  and  as  none  had  cracked  anything  remotely 
resembling  a  smile,  Roos  was  considerably  impressed 
— not  to  say  depressed.  (So  had  I  been  the  first  time 
I  heard  that  coroner  yarn.)  Nor  did  he  find  great 
comfort  in  the  hotel  proprietor's  really  well-meant 
attempt  at  reassurance.  "Don't  let  that  story  bother 
you,  my  boy,"  the  genial  McConnell  had  said;  "they 
never  did  take  the  coroner  round  the  Big  Bend.  Fact 
is,  there  never  was  a  coroner  here  that  had  the  guts  to 
tackle  it!" 

We  met  Blackmore  at  Beavermouth  the  afternoon 
of  the  twenty-eighth  of  September.  He  reported 
that  his  boat  had  been  shipped  from  Revelstoke  by 
that  morning's  way  freight,  and  should  arrive  the 
following  day.  As  I  had  been  unable  to  engage  a 
boatman  in  Golden,  and  as  Blackmore  had  found 
only  one  in  Revelstoke  to  suit  him,  it  was  decided  to 
give  me  an  oar  and  a  pike-pole  and  make  out  the  best 
we  could  without  another  man.  I  had  brought  pro- 
visions for  a  fortnight  with  me  from  Golden,  and 
Blackmore  had  tents  and  canvases.  Through  the  ef- 
forts of  influential  friends  in  Golden  I  had  also  been 


CANAL  FLATS  TO  BEAVERMOUTH   91 

able  to  secure  two  bottles  of  prime  Demerara  rum. 
Knowing  that  I  was  going  to  pick  up  at  least  one 
cask  of  Scotch  on  the  way,  and  perhaps  two  or  three, 
I  had  not  been  very  keen  about  bothering  with  the 
rum.  But  on  the  assurance  that  it  might  well  be  two 
or  three  days  before  any  whisky  was  found,  and  that 
getting  wet  in  the  Columbia  without  something  to 
restore  the  circulation  was  as  good  as  suicide,  I  al- 
lowed myself  to  be  persuaded.  It  was  wonderful 
stuff — thirty  per  cent,  over-proof;  which  means  that 
it  could  be  diluted  with  four  parts  of  water  and  still 
retain  enough  potency  to  make  an  ordinary  man  blink 
if  he  tried  to  bolt  it.  We  did  find  one  man — but  he 
was  not  ordinary  by  any  means;  far  from  it.  I  will 
tell  about  "Wild  Bill"  in  the  proper  place. 

There  was  a  wonderful  aurora  borealis  that  night — 
quite  the  finest  display  of  the  kind  I  recall  ever  having 
seen  in  either  the  northern  or  southern  hemispheres. 
Blackmore — weather-wise  from  long  experience — re- 
garded the  marvellous  display  of  lambently  licking 
light  streamers  with  mixed  feelings.  "Yes,  it's  a  fine 
show,"  he  said,  following  the  opalescent  glimmer  of 
the  fluttering  pennants  with  a  dubious  eye;  "but  I'm 
afraid  we'll  have  to  pay  through  the  nose  for  it.  It 
means  that  in  a  couple  of  days  more  the  rain  will  be 
streaming  down  as  fast  as  those  lights  are  streaming 
up.  Just  about  the  time  we  get  well  into  Surprise 
Rapids  there  will  be  about  as  much  water  in  the  air 
as  in  the  river.  However,  it  won't  matter  much,"  he 
concluded  philosophically,  "for  we'll  be  soaked  any- 
way, whether  we're  running  or  lining,  and  rain  water's 
ten  degrees  warmer  than  river  water." 


CHAPTER  VI 

I.      RUNNING    THE    BEND 

Through  Surprise  Rapids 

We  pushed  off  from  Bea vermouth  at  three  o'clock 
of  the  afternoon  of  September  twenty-ninth.    We  had 
hoped  for  an  early  start,  but  the  erratically  running 
local  freight,  six  or  eight  hours  behind  time,  did  not 
arrive  with  our  boat  until  noon.     The  introductory 
shots  had  already  been  made.    Made  up  momentarily 
as  a  gentleman — wearing  an  ankle  length  polished 
waterproof  and  a  clean  cap,  that  is, — I  jumped  the 
westbound  Limited  as  it  slowed  down  on  entering  the 
yard,  dropping  off  presently  at  the  platform  with  a 
"here-I-am"  expression  when  Roos  signalled  that  the 
focus  was  right.    Then  I  shook  hands  with  the  wait- 
ing Blackmore,  and  together  we  strode  to  the  door  of 
the  station  and  met  the  previously-rehearsed  agent. 
(Roos  had  wanted  me  to  shake  hands  with  the  agent 
as  well  as  with  Blackmore,  but  I  overruled  him  by 
pointing  out  that  I  was  a  "gentleman-sportsman"  not 
a  "gentleman-politician,"  and  served  notice  on  him 
that  pump-handling  must  henceforth  be  reduced  to  a 
minimum.)      We   tried   to   perfect   the   agent   in   a 
sweeping  gesture  that  would  say  as  plainly  as  words 
"The  train  with  your  boat  is  just  around  that  next 
bend,  sir,"  but  somehow  we  couldn't  prevent  his  try- 
ing to  elevate  his  lowly  part.     His  lips  mumbled 

92 


THROUGH  SURPRISE  RAPIDS       93 

the  words  we  had  put  on  them  all  right,  but  the  ges- 
ture was  a  grandiose  thing  such  as  a  Chesterfieldian 
footman  might  have  employed  in  announcing  "My 
Lord,  the  carriage  waits." 

Roos,  in  all  innocence,  narrowly  missed  provoking  a 
fight  with  a  hot-tempered  half-breed  while  he  was  set- 
ting up  to  shoot  the  incoming  freight.  He  had  an  in- 
genious method  of  determining,  without  bending  over 
his  finder,  just  what  his  lens  was  going  to  "pick-up." 
This  consisted  of  holding  his  arms  at  full  length,  with 
his  thumbs  placed  tip  to  tip  and  the  forefingers  stand- 
ing straight  up.  The  right-angling  digits  then 
framed  for  his  eye  an  approximation  of  his  picture. 
To  one  not  used  to  it  this  esoteric  performance  looked 
distinctly  queer,  especially  if  he  chanced  to  be  stand- 
ing somewhere  near  the  arch  priest's  line  of  vision. 
And  that,  as  it  happened,  was  exactly  the  place  from 
which  it  was  revealed  to  the  choleric  near-Shuswap 
section  hand.  I  didn't  need  the  breed's  subsequent 
contrite  explanation  to  know  that,  from  where  he  had 
been  standing,  those  twiddling  thumbs  and  fingers, 
through  the  great  fore-shortening  of  the  arms,  looked 
to  be  right  on  the  end  of  the  nose  of  the  grimacing 
little  man  by  the  camera.  'Not  even  a  self-respecting 
white  man  would  have  stood  for  what  that  twiddling 
connoted,  let  alone  a  man  in  whose  veins  flowed  blood 
that  must  have  been  something  like  fifteen-sixteenths 
of  the  proudest  of  Canadian  strains.  Luckily,  both 
Blackmore  and  his  burly  boatman  were  men  of  action. 
Even  so,  it  was  a  near  squeeze  for  both  camera  and 
cameraman.  Roos  emerged  unscarred  in  anything 
but  temperament.    And,  of  course,  as  every  one  even 


94  DOWN  THE  COLUINIBIA 

on  the  fringes  of  the  movies  knows,  the  tempera- 
ments of  both  stars  and  directors  are  things  that  re- 
quire frequent  harrowing  to  keep  them  in  good  work- 
ing order. 

Roos'  filming  of  the  unloading  of  the  boat  was  the 
best  thing  he  did  on  the  trip.  Every  available  man  in 
Beavermouth  was  requisitioned.  This  must  have  been 
something  like  twenty-five  or  thirty.  A  half  dozen, 
with  skids  and  rollers,  could  have  taken  the  boat  off 
without  exerting  themselves  seriously,  but  could 
hardly  have  "made  it  snappy."  And  action  was  what 
the  scene  demanded.  There  was  no  time  for  a  re- 
hearsal. The  agent  simply  told  us  where  the  car 
would  be  shunted  to,  Blackmore  figured  out  the  best 
line  from  there  over  the  embankment  and  through  the 
woods  to  the  river,  and  Roos  undertook  to  keep  up 
with  the  procession  with  his  camera.  Blackmore  was 
to  superintend  the  technical  operation  and  I  was  or- 
dered to  see  that  the  men  "acted  natural."  And  thus 
we  went  to  it.  The  big  boat,  which  must  have  weighed 
close  to  half  a  ton,  came  off  its  flat  car  like  a  paper 
shallop,  but  the  resounding  thwack  with  which  her 
bows  hit  a  switch-frog  awakened  Blackmore's  con- 
cern. "Easy!  Easy!  Don't  bust  her  bottom,"  he 
began  shouting;  while  I,  on  the  other  side,  took  up 
my  refrain  of  "Don't  look  at  the  camera! — make  it 
snappy."  The  consequence  of  these  diametrically  op- 
posed orders  was  that  the  dozen  or  more  men  on  my 
side  did  most  of  the  work.  But  even  so  it  was 
"snappy" — very. 

Down  the  embankment  we  rushed  like  a  speeding 
centipede,  straight  at  the  fine  hog-proof  wire  fence  of 


THROUGH  SURPRISE  RAPIDS       95 

the  C.  P.  R.  right-of-way.  That  fence  may  have  been 
hog-proof,  but  it  was  certainly  not  proof  against  the 
charge  of  a  thirty-foot  boat  coming  down  a  fifty  per 
cent,  grade  pushed  by  twenty-five  men.  We  had  in- 
tended lifting  over  it,  but  our  momentum  was  too 
great,  especially  after  I  had  failed  to  desist  from 
shouting  "Make  it  snappy!"  soon  enough.  The  bar- 
rier gave  way  in  two  or  three  places,  so  that  we  were 
shedding  trailing  lengths  of  wire  all  the  way  to  the 
river.  On  through  the  woods  we  juggernauted,  Roos 
following  in  full  cry.  His  city  "news  stuff"  training 
was  standing  him  in  good  stead,  and  he  showed  no 
less  cleverness  than  agility  in  making  successive  "set- 
ups" without  staying  our  progress.  Only  in  the  last 
fifty  yards,  where  the  going  over  the  moss  and  pine 
needles  was  (comparatively  speaking)  lightning  fast, 
did  we  distance  him.  Here,  as  there  was  plenty  of 
time,  he  cut  a  hole  in  the  trees  and  shot  the  launching 
through  one  of  his  favourite  "sylvan  frames."  For 
the  push-off  shot  he  provided  his  customary  heart 
throb  by  bringing  down  the  station  agent's  three- 
year-old  infant  to  wave  farewell.  That  he  didn't  try 
to  feature  the  mother  prominently  seemed  to  indicate 
that  what  I  had  said  at  Windermere  on  the  subject 
had  had  some  effect. 

After  the  "farewell"  had  been  filmed,  we  landed  at 
the  fire  ranger's  cabin  to  pick  up  Roos  and  his  camera. 
The  ranger  told  us  that  a  couple  of  trappers  who  had 
been  for  some  weeks  engaged  in  portaging  their  win- 
ter supplies  round  Surprise  Rapids  would  be  waiting 
for  us  at  the  head  of  the  first  fall  in  the  expectation  of 
getting  the  job  of  packing  our  stuff  down  to  the  foot. 


96  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

"Nothing  doing,"  Blackmore  replied  decisively; 
"going  straight  through."  The  ranger  grinned  and 
shook  his  grizzled  head.  "You're  the  man  to  do  it," 
he  said;  "but  jest  the  same,  I'm  glad  it's  you  and  not 
me  that  has  the  job." 

The  station  agent  came  down  with  Roos,  evidently 
with  the  cheering  purpose  of  showing  us  the  place 
where  his  predecessor  and  a  couple  of  other  men  had 
been  drowned  in  attempting  to  cross  the  river  some 
months  previously.  "Only  man  in  the  boat  to  be 
picked  up  alive  was  a  one-armed  chap,"  he  concluded 
impressively.  "Too  late  now  for  operations  on  any  of 
this  crew,"  laughed  Blackmore,  pushing  off  with  a 
pike-pole.  "Besides,  every  man  jack  of  us  is  going 
to  have  a  two-arm  job  all  the  way."  To  the  parting 
cheers  of  the  mackinawcd  mob  on  the  bank,  he  eased 
out  into  the  current  and  headed  her  down  the  Bend. 

Roos  stationed  himself  in  the  bow,  with  camera  set 
up  on  its  shortened  tripod,  waiting  to  surprise  any 
scenery  caught  lurking  along  the  way.  Blackmore 
steered  from  the  stern  with  his  seven-feet-long  birch 
paddle.  Andy  Kitson  and  I,  pulling  starboard  and 
port  oars  respectively,  rubbed  shoulders  on  the  broad 
'midship's  thwart.  Our  outfit — a  comparatively  light 
load  for  so  large  a  boat — was  stowed  pretty  well  aft. 
I  saw  Blackmore  lean  out  to  "con  ship"  as  we  got 
under  way.  "Good  trim,"  he  pronounced  finally, 
with  an  approving  nod.  "Just  load  enough  to  steady 
her,  and  yet  leave  plenty  of  freeboard  for  the  sloppy 
water.  This  ought  to  be  a  dryer  run  than  some  the 
old  girl's  had.  I  chuckled  to  myself  over  that  "dryer." 
I  hadn't  told  Blackmore  yet  what  was  hidden  down 


ARRIVAL  OF  OUR  BOAT  AT  BEA VERMOUTH    (above) 
OUR  FIRST  CAMP  AT  BEAVERMOUTH    (centre) 
THE  REMAINS  OF  A  SUNKEN   FOREST    (beloiv) 


TRAPPER'S  CABIN  WHERE  WE  FOUND  SHELTER  FOR  THE 

NIGHT  (above) 

WHERE   WE   LANDED   ABOVE   SURPRISE   RAPIDS    {centre) 
WHERE  WE  TIED  UP  AT  "EIGHT  MILE"    {below) 


THROUGH  SURPRISE  RAPIDS        97 

Canoe  River  way.  I  had  promised  Captain  Arm- 
strong not  to  do  so  until  I  had  ascertained  that  we  had 
a  teetotal  crew — or  one  comparatively  so. 

Andy  Kitson  was  a  big  husky  North-of-Irelander, 
who  had  spent  twenty  years  trapping,  packing,  hunt- 
ing, lumbering  and  boating  in  western  Canada.  Like 
the  best  of  his  kind,  he  was  deliberate  and  sparing  of 
speech  most  of  the  time,  but  with  a  fine  reserve  vo- 
cabulary for  emergency  use.  He  was  careful  and 
cautious,  as  all  good  river  boatmen  should  be,  but 
decidedly  "all  there"  in  a  pinch.  He  pulled  a  good 
round-armed  thumping  stroke  with  his  big  oar,  and 
took  to  the  water  { as  has  to  be  done  so  frequently  on 
a  bad  stretch  of  "lining  down")  like  a  beaver.  Best 
of  all,  he  had  a  temper  which  nothing  from  a  leak  in 
the  tent  dribbling  down  his  neck  to  a  half  hour  up  to 
his  waist  in  ice-cold  water  seemed  equal  to  ruffling.  I 
liked  Andy  the  moment  I  set  eyes  on  his  shining  red 
gill,  and  I  liked  him  better  and  better  every  day  I 
worked  and  camped  with  him. 

As  it  was  three-thirty  when  we  finally  pushed  off, 
Blackmore  announced  that  he  would  not  try  to  make 
farther  than  "Eight-Mile"  that  afternoon.  With  com- 
paratively good  water  all  the  way  to  the  head  of  Sur- 
prise Rapids,  we  could  have  run  right  on  through,  he 
said;  but  that  would  force  us  to  make  camp  after 
dark,  and  he  disliked  doing  that  unless  he  had  to.  In 
a  current  varying  from  three  to  eight  miles  an  hour, 
we  slid  along  down  stream  between  banks  golden-gay 
with  the  turning  leaves  of  poplar,  cottonwood  and 
birch,  the  bright  colours  of  which  were  strikingly  ac- 
centuated by  the  sombre  background  of  thick-growing 


98  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

spruce,  hemlock,  balsam  and  fir.  Yellow,  in  a  score 
of  shades,  was  the  prevailing  colour,  but  here  and 
there  was  a  splash  of  glowing  crimson  from  a  patch  of 
chin-chinich  or  Indian  tobacco,  or  a  mass  of  dull  ma- 
roon where  a  wild  rose  clambered  over  the  thicket. 
Closely  confined  between  the  Rockies  to  the  right  and 
the  Selkirks  to  the  west,  the  river  held  undeviatingly 
to  its  general  northwesterly  course,  with  only  the 
patchiest  of  flats  on  either  side.  And  this  was  the 
openest  part  of  the  Bend,  Blackmore  volunteered; 
from  the  head  of  Surprise  Rapids  to  the  foot  of  Priest 
Rapids  the  Columbia  was  so  steeply  walled  that  we 
would  not  find  room  for  a  clearing  large  enough  to 
support  a  single  cow.  "It's  a  dismal  hole,  and  no 
mistake,"  he  said. 

We  took  about  an  hour  to  run  to  "Eight  ^lile," 
Andy  and  I  pulling  steadily  all  the  way  in  the  deep, 
smoothly-running  current.  We  tied  up  in  a  quiet 
lagoon  opening  out  to  the  west — evidently  the  mouth 
of  a  high-water  channel.  There  was  a  magnificent 
stand  of  fir  and  spruce  on  a  low  bench  running  back 
from  the  river,  not  of  great  size  on  account  of  growing 
so  thickly,  but  amazing  lofty  and  straight.  We 
camped  in  the  shelter  of  the  timber  without  pitching 
a  tent,  Andy  and  Blackmore  sleeping  in  the  open  and 
Roos  and  I  in  a  tumble-down  trapper's  cabin.  Or 
rather  we  spread  our  blankets  in  the  infernal  hole. 
As  the  place  was  both  damp  and  rat-infested,  we  did 
not  sleep.  Roos  spent  the  night  chopping  wood  and 
feeding  the  rust-eaten — and  therefore  smoky — sheet- 
iron  stove.  I  divided  my  time  between  growling  at 
Roos  for  enticing  me  into  keeping  him  company  in  the 


THROUGH  SURPRISE  RAPIDS       99 

cabin  against  Blackmore's  advice,  and  throwing  things 
at  the  prowling  rodents.  It  did  not  make  for  increased 
cheerfulness  when  I  hit  him  on  the  ear  with  a  hob- 
nailed boot  that  I  had  intended  for  a  pair  of  eyes 
gleaming  vitreously  on  a  line  about  six  inches  back  of 
his  gloomily  bowed  head.  He  argued — and  with  some 
reason  I  must  admit — that  I  had  no  call  to  draw  so 
fine  a  bead  until  I  was  surer  of  my  aim.  Largely  as 
a  point  of  repartee,  I  told  him  not  to  be  too  certain  I 
was  not  sure  of  my  aim.  But  I  really  had  been  trying 
to  hit  the  rat.  .  .  . 

I  took  the  temperature  of  the  air  and  the  river 
water  in  the  morning,  finding  the  former  to  register 
thirty-eight  degrees  and  the  latter  forty-one.  There 
was  a  heavy  mist  resting  on  the  river  for  a  couple  of 
hours  after  daybreak,  but  it  was  lifting  by  the  time 
we  were  ready  to  push  off.  In  running  swift  water 
good  visibility  is  even  more  imperative  than  at  sea, 
but  as  there  was  nothing  immediately  ahead  to  bother 
Blackmore  did  not  wait  for  it  to  clear  completely. 
The  sun  was  shining  brightly  by  nine-thirty,  and  Roos 
made  several  shots  from  the  boat  and  one  or  two  from 
the  bank.  One  of  the  most  remarkable  sights  un- 
folded to  us  was  that  of  "Snag  Town."  Just  what 
was  responsible  for  this  queer  maze  of  up-ended  trees 
it  would  be  hard  to  say.  It  seems  probable,  however, 
that  a  series  of  heavy  spring  floods  undermined  a  con- 
siderable flat  at  the  bend  of  the  river,  carrying  away 
the  earth  and  leaving  the  trees  still  partially  rooted. 
The  broadening  of  the  channel  must  have  slowed 
down  the  current  a  good  deal,  and  it  appears  never  to 
have  been  strong  enough  to  scour  out  below  the  te- 


100  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

naciously  clinging  roots.  The  former  lords  of  the 
forest  are  all  dead,  of  course,  but  still  they  keep  their 
places,  inclining  downstream  perhaps  twenty-degrees 
from  their  former  proud  perpendicular,  and  firmly 
anchored.  It  takes  careful  steering  to  thread  the 
maze  even  in  a  small  boat,  but  the  current  is  hardly 
fast  enough  to  make  a  collision  of  serious  moment. 

The  current  quickened  for  a  while  beyond  "Snag 
Town"  and  then  began  slowing  again,  the  river  broad- 
ening and  deepening  meanwhile.  I  thought  I  read  the 
signs  aright  and  asked  Blackmore.  "Yes,"  he  replied 
with  a  confirmatory  nod;  "it's  the  river  backing  up  for 
its  big  jump.  Stop  pulling  a  minute  and  you  can 
probably  hear  the  rapid  growling  even  here."  Andy 
and  I  lay  on  our  oars  and  listened.  There  it  was 
surely  enough,  deep  and  distant  but  unmistakable — 
the  old  familiar  drum-roll  of  a  big  river  beating  for  the 
charge.  It  was  tremendous  music — heavy,  air-quiv- 
ering, earth-shaking;  more  the  diapason  of  a  great 
cataract  than  an  ordinary  rapid,  it  seemed  to  me.  I 
was  right.  Surprise  is  anything  but  an  ordinary 
rapid. 

We  pulled  for  a  half  hour  or  more  down  a  broad 
stretch  of  slackening  water  that  was  more  like  a  lake 
than  a  river.  Out  of  the  looming  shadows  of  the 
banks  for  a  space,  mountain  heights  that  had  been  cut 
off  leaped  boldly  into  view,  and  to  left  and  right  lifted 
a  lofty  sky-line  notched  with  snowy  peaks  rising  from 
corrugated  fields  of  bottle-green  glacier  ice.  Mt. 
Sanford,  loftiest  of  the  Selkirks,  closed  the  end  of  the 
bosky  perspective  of  Gold  Creek,  and  the  coldly 
chiselled  pyramids  of  Lyell,   Bryce  and   Columbia 


THROUGH  SURPRISE  RAPIDS      101 

pricked  out  the  high  points  on  the  Continental  Di- 
vide of  the  Rockies.  We  held  the  vivid  double  pano- 
rama— or  quadruple,  really,  for  both  ranges  were 
reflected  in  the  quiet  water — for  as  long  as  it  took  us 
to  pull  to  a  beach  at  the  narrowing  lower  end  of  the 
long  lake-like  stretch  above  the  rapids,  finally  to  lose 
it  as  suddenly  as  it  had  been  opened  to  us  behind  the 
imminently-rearing  river  walls. 

The  two  trappers  of  whom  the  fire-ranger  at 
Beavermouth  had  spoken  were  waiting  for  us  on  the 
bank.  They  had  permits  for  trapping  on  a  couple  of 
the  creeks  below  Kinbasket  Lake,  and  were  getting 
down  early  in  order  to  lay  out  their  lines  by  the  time 
the  season  opened  a  month  or  so  hence.  They  had 
been  packing  their  stuff  over  the  three-mile  portage 
to  the  foot  of  the  rapids  during  the  last  three  weeks, 
and  now,  with  nothing  left  to  go  but  their  canoes, 
were  free  to  give  us  a  hand  if  we  wanted  them.  Black- 
more  replied  that  he  could  save  time  and  labour  by 
running  and  lining  the  rapids.  "Besides,"  he  added 
with  a  grin,  "I  take  it  these  movie  people  have  come 
out  to  get  pictures  of  a  river  trip,  not  an  overland 
journey."  The  trappers  took  the  dig  in  good  part, 
but  one  of  them  riposted  neatly.  Since  he  was  out  for 
furs,  he  said,  and  was  not  taking  pictures  or  boot- 
legging, time  was  not  much  of  an  object.  The  main 
thing  with  him  was  to  reach  his  destination  with  his 
winter's  outfit.  If  all  the  river  was  like  Surprise 
Rapids  he  would  be  quite  content  to  go  overland  all 
the  way.  Neither  of  them  made  any  comments  on  the 
stage  of  the  water  or  offered  any  suggestions  in  con- 
nection with  the  job  we  had  ahead.     That  was  one 


102  DOWN  THE  COLUxMBIA 

comfort  of  travelling  with  Blackmore.  In  all  matters 
pertaining  to  river  work  his  judgment  appeared  to  be 
beyond  criticism.  If  he  was  tackling  a  stunt  with  a 
considerable  element  of  risk  in  it,  that  was  his  own 
business.  No  one  else  knew  the  dangers,  and  how  to 
avoid  them,  so  well  as  he. 

Blackmore  looked  to  the  trim  of  the  boat  carefully 
before  shoving  off,  putting  her  down  a  bit  more  by  the 
stern  it  seemed  to  me.  He  cautioned  me  on  only  one 
point  as  we  pulled  across  the  quarter  of  mile  to  where 
the  banks  ran  close  together  and  the  quiet  water 
ended.  "Don't  never  dip  deep  in  the  white  water,  and 
'specially  in  the  swirls,"  he  said,  stressing  each  word. 
"If  you  do,  a  whirlpool  is  more'n  likely  to  carry  your 
oar-blade  under  the  boat  and  tear  out  half  the  side 
'fore  you  can  clear  your  oarlock.  That's  the  way 
that  patched  gunnel  next  you  came  to  get  smashed." 
As  we  were  about  at  the  point  where  it  is  well  to  con- 
fine all  the  talking  done  in  the  boat  to  one  man,  I 
refrained  from  replying  that  I  had  been  told  the 
same  thing  in  a  dozen  or  so  languages,  on  four  differ- 
ent continents,  and  by  "skippers"  with  black,  yellow 
and  copper  as  well  as  white  skins,  at  fairly  frequent 
intervals  during  the  last  fifteen  years.  There  were 
enough  slips  I  might  make,  but  that  of  dipping  deep 
in  rough  water  was  hardly  likely  to  be  one  of  them. 

The  rumble  of  the  rapid  grew  heavier  as  we  pro- 
ceeded, but  only  a  single  flickering  white  "eyelash" 
revealed  the  imminent  ambush  lurking  beyond  the 
black  rocks.  The  current  accelerated  rapidly  as  the 
walls  closed  in,  but  ran  easily,  effortlessly,  unrip- 
plingly,  and  with  an  almost  uncanny  absence  of  swirls 


THROUGH  SURPRISE  RAPIDS      103 

and  eddies.  "Have  plenty  way  on  her  'fore  she 
hits  the  suds,"  cautioned  Blackmore,  and  Andy  and  I 
grunted  in  unison  as  we  leaned  a  few  more  pounds  of 
beef  onto  our  bending  spruces.  That  started  our  in- 
side elbows  to  bumping,  but  without  a  word  each  of 
us  sidled  along  an  inch  or  two  toward  his  gunwale  to 
get  well  set  while  yet  there  was  time. 

With  an  easy  bob — quick  like  a  rowboat  rides  the 
bow  wave  of  a  steamer,  but  smoother,  easier  in  its  lift 
— we  ran  into  the  head  of  the  rapid.  There  was  a 
swift  V-shaped  chute  of  smooth  jade-green  water; 
then  we  slapped  right  into  the  "suds."  High-headed 
waves  slammed  against  the  bows  and  threw  spray  all 
over  the  boat  and  far  astern  of  it.  But  they  lacked 
jolt.  They  had  too  much  froth  and  not  enough 
green  water  to  make  them  really  formidable.  We 
were  in  rough  but  not  really  bad  water.  I  tried  to 
grin  at  Blackmore  to  show  him  I  understood  the  situ- 
ation and  was  enjoying  it  highly;  but  his  eyes,  pin- 
points of  concentration  under  bent  brows,  were  di- 
rected over  my  head  and  far  in  advance.  Plainly,  he 
was  thinking  as  well  as  looking  well  ahead. 

Reassured  by  the  smart  way  we  were  slashing 
through  that  first  riffle,  I  ventured  to  steal  a  look  over 
my  shoulder.  In  the  immediate  foreground  Roos, 
with  his  waterproof  buttoned  close  around  his  neck, 
was  shaking  the  spray  out  of  his  hair  and  watching 
for  a  chance  to  snap  with  his  kodak.  Ahead  there  was 
perhaps  another  hundred  yards  of  about  the  same  sort 
of  water  as  that  in  which  we  were  running;  then  a 
yeasty  welter  of  white  where  the  river  disappeared 
round  a  black  cliff  into  what  seemed  a  narrow  gorge. 


104>  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

Opposite  the  cliff  the  river  wall  sloped  slightly  and 
was  thickly  covered  with  a  dense  growth  of  evergreen. 
The  heavy  roar  we  had  been  hearing  for  hours  was 
still  muffled.  Evidently  the  main  disturbance  was 
somewhere  beyond  the  bend  at  the  cliff. 

The  thunder  of  falling  water  grew  louder  as  we 
headed  down  toward  the  white  smother  in  the  em- 
brasure of  the  bend,  and  it  was  from  Blackmore's  lips 
rather  than  from  any  words  I  heard  that  I  gathered 
that  he  was  calling  for  "More  way!"  Still  keeping 
fairly  good  stroke,  Andy  and  I  quickly  had  her  going 
enough  faster  than  the  current  to  give  the  big  paddle 
all  the  steerage  "grip"  Blackmore  could  ask  for. 
Swinging  her  sharply  to  the  right,  he  headed  her  past 
the  out-reaching  rock  claws  at  the  foot  of  the  cliff, 
and,  with  a  sudden  blaze  of  light  and  an  ear-shatter- 
ing rush  of  sound  we  were  into  the  first  and  worst  fall 
of  Surprise  Rapids. 

That  dual  onslaught  of  light  and  sound  had  some- 
thing of  the  paralyzing  suddenness  of  that  which  oc- 
curs when  a  furnace  door  is  thrown  wide  and  eye  and 
ear  are  assailed  at  the  same  instant  with  the  glare  and 
the  roar  from  within.  One  moment  we  were  running 
in  a  shadowed  gorge  with  a  heavy  but  deadened  and 
apparently  distant  rumble  sounding  somewhere 
ahead;  the  next  we  were  in  the  heart  of  a  roar  that 
fairly  scoured  our  ear-drums,  and  blinking  in  a  flut- 
tering white  light  that  seemed  to  sear  the  eyeballs. 
The  one  hurried  glance  that  I  threw  behind  me  as  I 
began  floundering  on  the  end  of  my  kicking  oar 
photographed  an  intensely  vivid  picture  on  my  mem- 
ory. 


THROUGH  SURPRISE  RAPIDS      105 

What  had  been  merely  a  swiftly-flowing  river  with 
a  streak  of  silver  riffles  down  the  middle  had  changed 
to  a  tumultuous  tumble  of  cascades  that  gleamed  in 
solid  white  from  bank  to  bank  like  the  churned  snow 
of  a  freshly  descended  avalanche.  There  was  no  green 
water  whatever;  not  even  a  streak  that  was  tinged 
with  green.  All  that  relieved  the  coruscating,  sun- 
silvered  tumble  of  whiteness  were  the  black  tips  of 
jutting  bed-rock,  sticking  up  through  the  foam 
they  had  churned.  The  deeply  shadowed  western 
wall,  hanging  above  the  river  like  a  dusky  pall,  served 
only  to  accentuate  by  contrast  the  intense  white  light 
that  danced  above  the  cascade.  It  was  as  though  the 
golden  yellow  had  been  filtered  out  of  the  sunlight  in 
the  depths,  and  only  the  pure  blue-white  of  calcium 
reflected  back  into  the  atmosphere. 

Heavy  as  was  the  fall  of  the  river  over  the  stretch 
we  had  now  entered,  I  could  just  make  out  a  point 
perhaps  a  half  mile  farther  down  where  it  dropped 
out  of  sight  entirely.  That,  I  told  myself,  must  be 
the  place  where  there  was  an  unbroken  reef  of  bed- 
rock all  the  way  across  the  stream,  and  where  there 
was  an  abrupt  drop  of  eight  or  ten  feet.  A  great 
throbbing  rumble  cutting  into  the  slightly  higher- 
keyed  roar  that  already  engulfed  us  also  seemed  to 
indicate  that  the  steepest  pitch  had  not  yet  been 
reached.  I  had,  of  course,  seen  worse  water  than  this, 
but  certainly  had  never  (as  appeared  to  be  the  case 
now)  been  irretrievably  committed  to  running  it.  I 
had  heard  that  it  was  quite  unrunnable  in  any  kind 
of  a  boat,  it  certainly  looked  unrunnable,  and  I  seemed 
to  have  the  impression  that  Blackmore  had  said  he 


lOG  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

was  not  intending  to  run  it.  Yet  here  we  were  into 
it,  and  without  (so  far  as  I  could  see)  anything  to  do 
but  drive  ahead.  However,  that  was  Blackmore's 
affair.  .  .  . 

The  rather  smart  team-work  which  Andy  and  I  had 
maintained  for  a  while  dissolved  like  the  morning 
mists  as  we  banged  in  among  the  walloping  rollers  at 
the  head  of  the  real  cascade.  Both  of  us  were  in  dif- 
ficulties, but  his  round-armed  thumping  stroke 
seemed  rather  more  true  to  form  than  the  shattered 
remnants  of  my  fine  straight-armed  slide-and-recover, 
with  its  dainty  surface-skimming  "feather."  Noth- 
ing but  the  sharpest  of  dabs  with  the  tip  of  an  oar  can 
get  any  hold  in  a  current  of  fifteen  to  twenty  miles  an 
hour,  and  the  short,  wristy  pull  (which  is  all  there  is 
time  for)  doesn't  impart  a  lot  of  impulse  to  a  thirty- 
foot  boat.  That,  and  the  staggering  buffets  on  the 
bows,  for  it  was  solid,  lumpy  water  that  was  coming 
over  us  now,  quickly  reduced  our  headway.  (Head- 
way through  the  current,  I  mean;  our  headway  float- 
ing in  the  current  was  terrific.)  This  was,  of  course,  a 
serious  handicap  to  Blackmore,  as  it  deprived  him  of 
much  of  the  steerage-way  upon  which  he  was  depend- 
ent for  quick  handling  of  the  boat.  The  difficulty  of 
maintaining  steerage-way  in  rough  water  with  oars 
makes  a  bow  as  well  as  a  stern  paddle  very  desirable  in 
running  bad  rapids.  The  bow  paddler  can  keep  a 
very  sharp  lookout  for  rocks  immediately  ahead,  and, 
in  a  pinch,  can  jerk  the  boat  bodily  to  one  side  or  the 
other,  where  oarsmen  have  to  swing  it.  However, 
Blackmore  knew  just  what  he  was  going  up  against, 


THROUGH  SURPRISE  RAPIDS      107 

and  had  made  the  best  disposition  possible  of  his 
available  crew.  ' 

I  was  too  busy  keeping  myself  from  being  bucked 
off  the  thwart  by  my  floundering  oar  to  steal  more 
than  that  first  hurried  look  over  my  shoulder.  It  was 
not  my  concern  what  was  ahead  anyway.  All  I  had 
to  do  was  to  take  a  slap  at  the  top  of  a  wave  every  time 
I  saw  a  chance,  and  be  ready  to  back,  or  throw  my 
weight  into  a  heavy  stroke,  when  Blackmore  needed 
help  to  turn  her  this  way  or  that.  My  signal — a  jerk 
of  the  steersman's  head  to  the  left — came  sooner  than 
I  expected.  It  looked  a  sheer  impossibility  to  drive 
through  the  maze  of  rocks  to  the  bank,  yet  that — 
after  a  long,  anxious  look  ahead — was  evidently  what 
he  had  decided  to  attempt.  As  it  was  my  oar  he  called 
on,  I  knew  it  was  the  right  or  east  bank,  a  sharply 
sloping  reach  of  black  bedrock  littered  with  water- 
scoured  boulders. 

By  the  way  Blackmore  wasdeaning  onto  his  paddle 
I  knew  that  he  needed  all  the  pull  I  could  give  him 
to  bring  her  round.  Swinging  back  hard,  I  threw 
every  pound  I  had  onto  my  oar.  For  an  instant  the 
lack  of  resistance  as  the  blade  tore  through  foam 
nearly  sent  me  reeling  backwards;  then  it  bit  into 
solid  water,  and,  under  impulse  of  oar  and  paddle,  the 
boat  pivoted  through  more  than  half  a  quadrant  and 
shot  straight  for  the  bank.  Right  in  where  the  black 
rock  tips  were  scattered  like  the  raisins  in  a  pudding 
he  headed  her.  There  was  no  room  to  use  the  oars 
now,  but  she  still  carried  more  than  enough  way  to 
send  her  to  the  bank.    Or  rather,  it  would  have  carried 


108  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

her  through  if  the  course  had  been  clear.  Missing  two 
or  three  rocks  by  inches,  she  rasped  half  her  length 
along  another,  and  onto  a  fourth — lurking  submerged 
by  a  foot — she  jammed  full  tilt.  It  was  her  port  bow 
that  struck,  and  from  the  crasli  it  seemed  impossible 
that  she  could  have  escaped  holing.  Andy  went  over 
the  side  so  suddenl}^  that,  until  I  saw  him  balancing  on 
a  rock  and  trying  to  keep  the  boat  from  backing  off 
into  the  current,  I  thought  he  had  been  thrown  over- 
board by  the  impact.  Thumping  her  bow  with  his 
boot,  he  reported  her  leaking  slightly  but  not  much 
damaged.  Then,  swinging  her  round  into  an  eddy, 
he  jumped  off  into  the  waist-deep  water  and  led  her 
unresistingly  up  against  the  bank.  It  was  astonishing 
to  see  so  wild  a  creature  so  suddenlj^  become  tame. 

We  w^ould  have  to  "line  down"  from  here  to  the 
foot  of  the  first  fall,  Blackmore  said.  While  Roos  was 
setting  up  his  camera  the  veteran  explained  that  he 
could  have  run  four  or  five  hundred  yards  farther 
down,  right  to  the  brink  of  the  "tip  off,"  but  that  he 
preferred  getting  in  out  of  the  wet  where  he  had  a 
good  landing.  I  agreed  with  him  heartily — without 
putting  it  in  words.  But  if  that  was  his  idea  of  a 
"good  landing  place,"  I  hoped  he  would  continue  to 
avoid  bad  ones. 

The  basic  principles  of  "lining  down"  are  the  same 
on  all  rivers.  Where  water  is  too  rough  to  run,  it  is 
the  last  resort  before  portaging.  As  generally  prac- 
tised, one  man,  walking  along  the  bank,  lets  the  boat 
down  with  a  line,  while  another — or  as  many  others 
as  are  available — keeps  it  off  the  rocks  with  poles. 
"Lining"  can  be  effected  more  rapidly  and  with  much 


THROUGH  SURPRISE  RAPIDS      109 

less  effort  if  one  man  remains  in  the  boat  and  fends  off 
with  his  pole  from  there.  This  is  much  the  better 
method  where  the  fall  is  not  too  great  and  the  water 
comparatively  warm.  On  the  upper  Columbia,  where 
the  breaking  away  of  a  boat  from  a  line  means  its 
almost  inevitable  loss  with  all  on  board,  it  is  resorted 
to  only  when  absolutely  necessary,  and  when  a  man 
of  great  experience  is  handling  the  line.  It  takes  a 
natural  aptitude  and  years  of  experience  for  a  man  to 
master  all  the  intricacies  of  "lining."  I  shall  not  en- 
deavour to  enumerate  even  the  few  that  I  am  familiar 
with;  but  the  one  thing  beyond  all  others  to  avoid  is 
letting  the  bow  of  the  boat  swing  outwards  when  the 
stern  is  held  up  by  a  rock.  This  brings  the  full  cur- 
rent of  the  river  against  its  up-stream  side,  exerting  a 
force  that  a  dozen  men  could  not  hold  against,  let 
alone  one  or  two.  As  Blackmore  was  noted  for  his 
mastery  of  the  "lining"  game,  however,  we  had  no 
apprehension  of  trouble  in  this  department. 

Nothing  of  the  outfit  save  the  moving  picture  cam- 
era was  removed  from  the  boat  at  this  juncture.  Coil- 
ing his  line — something  over  a  hundred  feet  of  half- 
inch  Manila  hemp — over  his  left  arm,  Blackmore 
signalled  Andy  to  shove  off.  Paying  out  the  line 
through  his  right  hand,  he  let  the  eddy  carry  the  boat 
out  into  the  drag  of  the  current.  Armed  with  long 
pike-poles,  Andy  and  I  ran  on  ahead  to  keep  it  clear 
of  the  banks  as  it  swung  in.  This  was  easy  enough 
as  long  as  we  had  only  the  bank  to  contend  with. 
But  almost)  immediately  the  trouble  which  makes 
Surprise  Rapids  one  of  the  nastiest  stretches  on  any 
river  in  the  world  to  line  began  to  develop.     This 


110  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

came  from  the  submerged  rocks  which  crop  up  all 
along  between  the  banks  and  the  deeper  water  of 
mid-channel. 

Pulling  her  up  and  releasing  her  with  a  hand  that 
reminded  me  of  that  of  a  consummate  natural  horse- 
man, Blackmore  nursed  the  boat  along  and  managed 
to  avoid  most  of  these  obstructions.  But  every  now 
and  then  she  would  wedge  between  a  close-set  pair 
of  boulders  and  resist  the  force  of  the  current  to  drive 
her  on.  At  such  times  it  was  up  to  Andy  and  me  to 
wade  in  and  try  to  dislodge  her  with  our  poles.  Fail- 
ing this,  we  had  to  wade  out  still  farther  and  lift 
her  through.  Andy  always  took  the  lead  in  this  lift- 
ing business,  claiming  that  it  required  a  lot  of  experi- 
ence to  know  just  the  instant  to  stop  shoving  at  the 
boat  as  she  began  to  move,  and  start  bracing  against 
the  current  to  keep  from  getting  carried  away.  I 
have  no  doubt  he  was  right.  In  any  event  he  would 
never  let  me  come  out  until  he  had  tugged  and  hauled 
for  several  minutes  trying  to  budge  her  alone,  and 
even  then — notwithstanding  his  four  or  five  inches 
less  of  height — he  always  took  his  station  in  the  deep- 
est hole.  Two  or  three  times,  shaking  himself  like  a 
Newfoundland,  he  came  out  wet  to  the  armpits  with 
the  icy  water.  As  the  sun  was  beating  hotly  upon 
the  rocks,  however,  neither  of  us  felt  the  cold  much 
that  afternoon.    A  few  days  later  it  was  another  story. 

We  made  something  like  eight  or  nine  hundred 
yards  before  we  stopped — right  to  the  head  of  the 
roaring  chute  that  ran  down  to  the  sheer  drop-oif. 
Roos — always  at  his  best  when  there  was  plenty  of 
unpremeditated  action  going  on,  so  that  "directorial" 


THROUGH  SURPRISE  RAPIDS      111 

worries  sat  lightly  on  him — followed  us  closely  all  the 
way.  It  was  hard  enough  keeping  one's  footing  on 
those  ice-slippery  boulders  at  all ;  how  he  managed  it 
with  something  like  a  hundred  pounds  of  camera  and 
tripod  over  his  shoulder  and  a  bulky  case  in  one  hand 
is  more  than  I  can  figure.  But  he  did  it,  keeping 
close  enough  so  that  he  got  just  about  everything 
without  having  to  ask  us  to  do  it  over  again.  This 
latter  was  a  good  deal  of  a  comfort,  especially  in 
those  waist-deep-in-the-Columbia  lifting  stunts.  I 
had  always  hated  "lining  down,"  even  in  the  tropics, 
and  I  already  saw  that  what  we  had  ahead  wasn't 
going  to  modify  my  feelings  for  the  better. 

At  the  head  of  that  rough-and-tumble  cascade  lead- 
ing to  the  fall,  Blackmore  decided  that  we  would  have 
to  unload  the  boat  completely  before  trying  to  let  her 
down.  It  was  always  bad  business  there  at  the  best,  he 
said,  and  the  present  stage  of  water  made  the  rocks 
quite  a  bit  worse  than  when  either  higher  or  lower. 
If  we  hustled,  there  ought  to  be  time  to  get  through 
before  dark,  and  then  a  half  mile  run  would  take  us 
to  a  good  camping  place  near  the  head  of  the  second 
fall.  Here  Roos  intervened  to  point  out  that  the  sun 
was  already  behind  the  western  wall,  and  asking  if  it 
wouldn't  be  possible  to  camp  where  we  were.  He 
wanted  to  keep  the  "continuity"  of  this  particular 
piece  of  "lining"  unbroken,  and  would  need  good 
light  to  finish  it  in.  Blackmore  said  he  could  manage 
the  camp  if  we  thought  our  ear-drums  would  stand  the 
roar. 

So  we  unloaded  the  boat,  and  Blackmore  leading 
her  into  the  quietest  pool  he  could  find,  moored  her 


112  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

for  the  night.  As  there  was  a  couple  of  feet  of  "lop" 
even  there,  this  was  rather  a  nice  operation.  With 
lines  to  stern  and  bow,  and  held  off  from  the  rocks  on 
either  side  by  lashed  pike-poles,  she  looked  for  all  the 
world  like  some  fractious  horse  that  had  been  secured 
to  prevent  its  banging  itself  up  against  the  sides  of 
its  stall.  It  was  a  beastly  job,  carrying  the  fifteen  or 
twenty  heavy  parcels  of  the  outfit  a  hundred  yards 
over  those  huge  polished  boulders  to  the  bit  of  sand- 
bar where  camp  was  to  be  pitched.  My  old  ankles — 
endlessly  sprained  during  my  football  days — pro- 
tested every  step  of  my  several  round  trips,  and  I 
congratulated  myself  that  I  had  had  the  foresight  to 
bring  leather  braces  to  stiffen  them.  Reeking  with 
perspiration  after  I  had  thrown  down  my  last  load,  I 
decided  to  use  the  river  for  a  bath  that  I  would  have 
to  take  anyway  on  shifting  from  my  wet  clothes.  The 
half -glacial  water  was  not  a  lot  above  freezing,  of 
course;  but  that  is  of  small  moment  when  one  has 
plenty  of  animal  heat  stored  up  to  react  against  it. 
My  worst  difficulty  was  from  the  bmnpiness  of  my 
rocky  bathing  pool,  which  also  had  a  rather  trouble- 
some undercurrent  pulling  out  toward  the  racing 
chute  of  the  main  channel.  Blackmore,  pop-eyed  with 
astonishment,  came  down  to  watch  the  show.  It  was 
the  first  time  he  had  ever  seen  a  man  take  a  voluntary 
bath  in  Surprise  Rapids,  he  said.  And  all  the  others 
— the  involuntary  bathers — they  had  picked  up  later 
in  Kinbasket  Lake. 

That  was  about  the  most  restricted  space  I  can 
recall  ever  having  camped  in.  The  great  boulders 
of  the  high-water  channel  extended  right  up  to  the 


THROUGH  SURPRISE  RAPIDS      113 

foot  of  the  mountain  wall  and  neither  the  one  nor  the 
other  afforded  enough  level  space  to  set  a  doll's  house. 
A  four-by-six  patch  of  sand  was  the  most  extensive 
area  that  seemed  to  offer,  and,  doubling  this  in  size 
by  cutting  away  a  rotting  spruce  stump  and  a  section 
of  fallen  birch,  there  was  just  enough  room  for  the 
little  shed-tent.  It  was  a  snug  and  comfortable  camp, 
though,  and  highly  picturesque,  perched  as  it  was  al- 
most in  the  spray  of  the  cascade.  The  noise  was  the 
worst  thing,  and  we  would  have  had  to  stay  there 
even  longer  than  we  did  to  become  quite  used  to  it. 
All  of  us  were  shouting  in  each  other's  ears  for  days 
afterwards,  and  even  trying  to  converse  in  signs  in  the 
idyllic  quietude  of  Kinbasket  Lake. 

The  storm  which  Blackmore's  seer-like  vision  had 
descried  in  the  blue-green  auroral  flutters  of  a  couple 
of  nights  previously  arrived  quite  on  schedule.  Al- 
though the  western  sky  had  glowed  for  half  an  hour 
after  sunset  with  that  supposedly  optimistic  tinge  of 
primrose  and  terra-cotta,  it  was  pouring  before  mid- 
night, and  the  next  morning  there  was  truly  almost 
as  much  water  in  the  air  as  in  the  river.  Pictures  were 
out  of  the  question,  so  there  was  nothing  to  do  but 
hang  on  until  the  weather  cleared.  Leaving  Roos 
whittling  and  Andy  struggling  to  divert  a  swelling 
young  river  that  was  trying  to  sluice  away  the  sand 
on  which  the  tent  was  pitched,  Blackmore  and  I  pulled 
on  our  waterproofs  and  clambered  a  mile  through  the 
woods  to  a  camp  of  C.  P.  R.  engineers.  Blackmore 
wanted  to  get  an  extra  axe;  I  to  get  some  further 
data  on  the  fall  of  the  river.  We  found  a  crude  cable- 
ferry  thrown  across  just  below  the  foot  of  the  big 


114  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

fall,  and  a  rough,  boggy  path  from  the  eastern  end  of 
it  took  us  to  the  camp  of  three  or  four  comfortable 
cabins. 

The  Canadian  Pacific,  I  learned — both  on  account 
of  the  high  and  increasing  cost  of  its  oil  fuel  and  be- 
cause of  the  trouble  experienced  in  clearing  their  tun- 
nels from  smoke — was  contemplating  the  electrifica- 
tion of  all  of  its  mountain  divisions.  There  were 
numerous  high  falls  along  the  line  where  power  could 
be  economically  developed,  but  it  was  not  considered 
desirable  that  the  scenic  beauty  of  these  should  be 
marred  by  diversion.  Besides  the  Colum.bia,  in  a 
hundred  miles  of  the  Big  Bend,  offered  the  oppor- 
tunity for  developing  more  hydro-electric  energy  than 
all  the  west  of  Canada  could  use  in  the  next  twenty 
years.  The  Surprise  Rapids  project  alone  would 
provide  far  more  power  than  the  Canadian  Pacific 
could  use  for  traction,  and  it  was  expected  that  there 
would  be  a  large  surplus  for  municipal  and  industrial 
uses  along  the  line.  "All  this,  of  course,"  the  en- 
gineer at  the  camp  explained,  "in  the  event  the  com- 
pany decides  to  go  ahead  with  the  development. 
Raising  the  money  will  probably  be  the  greatest  dif- 
ficulty, and  in  the  present  state  of  the  financial  mar- 
ket it  is  hard  to  see  how  much  can  be  done  for  two 
or  three  jxars.  In  the  meantime  we  are  measuring 
the  flow  of  the  river  every  day,  and  will  have  accurate 
data  to  go  by  when  the  time  for  construction  comes." 

I  learned  that  the  total  length  of  Surprise  Rapids 
was  three  and  a  third  miles,  in  which  distance  there 
was  a  fall  of  nearly  one  hundred  feet.  The  greatest 
drop  was  in  that  stretch  which  we  were  waiting  to 


THROUGH  SURPRISE  RAPIDS      115 

"line,"  where  there  was  a  fall  of  twenty-one  feet  in 
seven  hundred  and  fifty.  At  the  second  cascade 
there  was  a  fall  of  fifteen  feet  in  twelve  hundred, 
and  at  the  third,  twenty-five  feet  in  twenty-five  hun- 
dred. It  was  planned  to  build  the  dam  across  the 
very  narrow  canyon  near  the  foot  of  the  lower  fall, 
making  it  of  such  a  height  that  a  lake  would  be  backed 
up  as  far  as  Beavermouth,  incidentally,  of  course, 
wiping  out  the  whole  of  Surprise  Rapids.  "They 
can't  wipe  it  out  any  too  soon  to  suit  me,"  Black- 
more  commented  on  hearing  this.  "It'd  have  saved 
me  a  lot  of  work  and  many  a  wetting  if  they'd  wiped 
it  out  twenty  year  ago.  And  that's  saying  nothing 
of  the  men  drownded  there.  It  was  that  big  whirl- 
pool down  through  the  trees  there  that  did  for  Walter 
Steinhoif." 

We  had  left  the  camp  now  and  were  picking  our 
way  down  the  narrow  trail  to  the  foot  of  the  second 
fall.  I  had  been  waiting  to  hear  Blackmore  speak  of 
Steinhoff  for  two  reasons :  first,  because  I  was  curious 
to  know  how  much  truth  there  was  in  those  dramatic 
versions  of  his  death  I  had  heard  in  Golden,  and  also 
because  the  subject  would  lead  up  naturally  to  that 
of  the  buried  whisky.  This  latter  was  rather  too 
delicate  a  matter  to  broach  offhand,  and  I  had  there- 
fore been  carefully  watching  for  a  favourable  opening. 
Now  that  it  had  come,  I  was  quick  to  take  advantage 
of  it. 

"Tell  me  about  Steinhoff,"  I  said.  "He  was  on 
some  kind  of  a  boot-legging  stunt,  wasn't  he?"  I 
was  just  a  bit  diffident  about  bringing  up  that  drink- 
running  business,  for  although  I  had  been  told  that 


116  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

Blackmore  was  a  smooth  hand  at  the  game  himself, 
I  had  a  sort  of  sneaking  idea  that  it  was  the  kind  of 
a  thing  a  man  ought  to  be  sensitive  about,  like  having 
had  smallpox  or  a  sister  in  the  movies.  I  need  not  have 
worried,  however.  "You  bet  he  was  boot-legging," 
Blackmore  replied;  "and  so  was  I.  Both  outfits 
heading  for  Tete  Jaune  Cache  on  the  Grand  Trunk, 
and  racing  to  get  there  first.  That  was  what  got  him 
into  trouble — trying  to  catch  up  with  me  after  I  had 
passed  him  by  running  and  lining  the  first  fall  (the 
one  we  are  doing  the  same  way  now)  w^hile  he  had 
portaged.  I  reckon  it  was  his  first  intention  to  por- 
tage all  the  way  to  the  foot  of  the  second  fall,  but 
when  he  saw  me  slip  by  in  the  water  he  put  in  his 
canoes  at  the  foot  of  the  first  fall  and  came  after  me." 
We  had  come  out  above  the  river  now,  and  I  saw 
a  savage  stretch  of  foam-white  water  falling  in  a  roar- 
ing cascade  to  a  mighty  whirlpool  that  filled  all  of 
the  bottom  of  the  steeply-walled  amphitheatre  formed 
by  a  right-angling  bend  of  the  Columbia.  Thirty 
feet  or  more  above  the  present  level  of  the  whirlpool 
were  the  marks  of  its  swirling  scour  at  mid-summer 
high-water.  Awesome  enough  now  (and  it  was  not 
any  the  less  so  to  me  since  we  still  had  to  take  the 
boat  through  it),  I  could  see  at  once  that,  with  the 
power  of  the  floods  driving  it  round  and  round  at 
turbine  speed,  it  must  indeed  be  a  veritable  thing  of 
terror.  It  was  into  this  whirlpool,  as  well  as  others 
at  Revelstoke  Canyon  and  Death  Rapids,  that  whole 
uprooted  pines  were  said  to  be  sucked  in  flood-time, 
to  reappear  only  as  battered  logs  many  miles  below. 
There  seemed  hardly  enough  water  there  at  the  pres- 


THROUGH  SURPRISE  RAPIDS      117 

ent  to  make  this  possible;  but  the  story  was  at  least 
credible  to  me  now,  which  was  more  than  it  had  been 
previously. 

"So  this  is  your  'All  Day  Sucker,'  "  I  remarked 
carelessly,  in  a  studied  attempt  to  keep  Blackmore 
from  noting  how  greatly  the  savage  maelstrom  had 
impressed  me.  Seeing  through  the  bluff,  he  grinned 
indulgently  and  resumed  his  story  of  Steinhoff  as 
soon  as  we  had  moved  far  enough  round  the  whirlpool 
to  make  his  voice  comfortably  heard  above  the  roar 
of  the  cascade.  A  line  had  parted — sawed  through 
in  working  round  a  rocky  point  a  few  hundred  yards 
above — and  Steinhoff's  big  Peterboro  was  swept  out 
into  the  current.  Striking  a  rock,  it  turned  over  and 
threw  him  into  the  water.  He  made  a  brave  effort 
to  swim  out,  keeping  his  head  above  water  most  of 
the  way  down  the  cascade.  The  whirlpool  had  been 
too  much  for  him,  however.  He  was  fighting  hard 
to  keep  up  when  he  was  carried  into  the  vortex  and 
sucked  under.  Blackmore  took  no  stock  in  the  story 
of  the  dramatic  gesture  of  farewell.  "A  man  don't 
pull  that  grand  opiy  stuff  with  the  cold  of  the  Co- 
lumbia biting  into  his  spine,"  was  the  way  he  put  it. 

Then  I  told  him  about  the  whisky — spoke  to  him 
as  a  son  to  his  father.  And  he,  meeting  me  point  for 
point  in  all  seriousness  of  spirit,  answered  as  father  to 
son.  He  thought  there  was  little  chance  of  finding 
anything  along  the  river.  He  had  not  done  so  him- 
self for  a  number  of  years — and  he  hadn't  been  over- 
looking any  bets,  either.  There  was,  of  course,  still 
much  good  stuff  buried  in  the  drift  below  Middle 
River,  but  it  would  be  like  looking  for  a  needle  in  a 


118  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

haystack  trying  to  find  it.  But  the  cache  above 
Canoe  River — ah,  that  was  another  matter!  Captain 
Armstrong  could  be  absohitely  depended  upon  in  a 
matter  of  that  kind,  and  the  directions  sounded  right 
as  rain.  Yes,  he  quite  understood  that  I  should  want 
to  take  it  all  to  California  with  me.  He  would  want 
to  do  the  same  thing  if  he  were  in  my  place.  It  would 
be  easy  as  picking  pippins  getting  it  over  the  line. 
He  could  tell  me  three  different  ways,  all  of  them 
dead  sure.  He  would  not  think  of  taking  any  of  it 
for  himself.  The  rum  we  had  would  be  ample  for  the 
trip,  except  in  extreme  emergency.  That  "thirty 
over-proof"  went  a  long  way.  And  I  need  not  worry 
in  the  least  about  Andy.  He  wasn't  a  teetotaler 
exactly,  but  he  never  took  too  much  under  any  provo- 
cation. Yes,  I  could  depend  upon  the  both  of  them 
to  nose  out  that  stuff  at  the  old  ferry.  Put  it  there! 
We  looked  each  other  square  in  the  eye,  and  shook 
hands  solemnly  there  above  the  big  whirlpool  which 
was  originally  responsible  for  the  good  fortune  that 
had  come  to  us — or  rather  to  me.  Men  have  clasped 
hands  and  sworn  to  stand  by  each  other  in  lesser 
things.  At  least  that  was  the  way  it  seemed  to  me 
at  the  moment.  I  could  have  embraced  the  fine  old 
woodsman  for  his  loyalty  and  generosity  of  spirit. 
I  always  called  him  Bob  after  that. 

The  rain  thinned  down  and  became  a  light  Scotch 
mist  as  we  picked  our  way  back  to  camp.  That  struck 
me  as  being  a  good  omen — it's  being  "Scotch,"  I 
mean.  Later  it  cleared  up  entirely,  and  there  was  a 
glorious  fairweather  sunset  of  glowing  saffron  and 
flaming    poppy    red.      To    the    northwest — Canoe 


THROUGH  SURPRISE  RAPIDS      119 

River-ward — there  poured  a  wonderful  light  of  pale 
liquescent  amber.  I  had  never  seen  such  a  light  on 
land  or  sea,  I  told  myself ;  or  anywhere  else,  for  that 
matter — except  when  holding  a  glass  of  Scotch  up 
against  the  sun.  That  was  another  good  omen. 
Funny  thing,  but  I  can  still  recall  the  date  offhand, 
so  indelibly  had  the  promise  of  that  day  impressed 
itself  on  my  mind.    It  was  the  first  of  October. 

Although  it  snowed  an  inch  or  two  during  the  night, 
the  following  morning  fulfilled  the  promise  of  the 
sunset  by  breaking  bright  and  cloudless.  We  were 
to  line  the  boat  down  empty  for  a  couple  of  hundred 
yards,  and  then  load  up  again  and  line  about  an 
equal  distance  of  slightly  better  water.  This  would 
take  us  to  the  brink  of  the  abrupt  fall,  where  both 
outfit  and  boat  had  to  be  portaged  over  the  rocks  for 
a  short  distance.  That  would  leave  us  clear  for  the 
short,  swift  run  to  the  head  of  the  second  fall. 

Cutting  himself  a  "sylvan  frame"  through  the 
pines  on  a  point  a  hundred  yards  below  the  camp, 
Roos  set  up  to  shoot  the  first  piece  of  lining.  It  was 
a  mean  looking  job,  for  the  river  was  tumbling  in  a 
half-cataract  all  the  way,  turning  and  squirming  like 
a  wounded  dragon.  I  could  see  Blackmore  was  a  bit 
worried  over  it,  and,  as  the  sequel  proved,  with  good 
reason.  I  never  quite  understood  his  explanation  of 
the  cause  of  what  happened,  but  I  believe  he  claimed 
it  was  due  to  his  obeying  (against  his  better  judg- 
ment) Roos'  signal  to  keep  the  boat  in  fairly  close 
to  the  bank  so  that  she  would  not  pass  "out  of  the 
picture" — beyond  the  range  of  his  lens,  that  is.  At 
any  rate,  the  boat  had  hardly  started  before  she  swung 


120  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

broadside  to  the  current  and,  clapping  like  a  limpet 
upon  a  big  round  boulder,  hung  there  immovable. 
Heeled  till  her  starboard  side  showed  like  the  belly 
of  a  sharply  sheering  shark,  her  port  gunwale  dipped 
deep  into  the  swirling  current.  In  a  wink  she  had 
taken  all  the  water  she  would  hold  with  the  half -heel 
that  was  on  her — enough,  perhaps,  to  fill  her  half  full 
when  on  an  even  keel. 

It  was  a  case  for  instant  action — a  case  where  the 
nearest  available  man  had  to  follow  his  first  hunch 
without  thinking  it  over  or  counting  the  cost.  A  few 
seconds  more  on  that  rock,  and  one  of  two  things 
must  happen  to  the  boat:  either  she  would  settle  a 
few  inches  farther,  fill  completelj^  and  sink,  or  else 
the  force  of  the  current  would  tear  her  to  pieces  where 
she  was.  Blackmore  was  tugging  at  his  line  and 
shouting  directions,  but  the  roar  stopped  the  words 
at  his  lips.  Andy  did  not  need  to  be  told  what  was 
needed,  however.  For  myself,  I  was  not  quite  sure  of 
what  to  do,  and  less  so  of  how  to  do  it.  Also,  I 
doubted  my  ability  to  keep  my  footing  in  the  current. 
In  short,  I  found  myself  thinking  and  weighing 
chances  in  one  of  those  emergencies  where  a  man  to 
be  worth  his  salt  has  no  business  to  do  either 

There  was  only  one  place  where  a  man  could  get 
at  the  boat,  and  Andy  beat  me  to  it  by  a  mile.  (I 
would  have  seen  to  that  even  had  he  moved  a  lot 
slower  than  he  did.)  He  was  rather  more  than  waist 
deep,  but  quite  safe  as  long  as  the  boat  stuck  where 
she  was.  Unfortunately,  getting  her  off  was  the  very 
thing  he  was  there  for.  It  was  a  good  deal  like  a 
man's  having  to  saw  off  the  branch  on  which  he  sat. 


THROUGH  SURPRISE  RAPIDS      121 

But  Andy  never  hesitated — probably  because  there 
was  not  time  to  think  and  reckon  the  consequences. 
Setting  his  heavy  shoulders  under  her  bilge,  he  gave 
a  mighty  upward  heave.  She  shuddered  through  her 
long  red  length,  and  then,  as  the  kick  of  the  current 
got  under  her  submerged  gunwale,  shot  up  and  off  as 
though  discharged  from  a  catapult.  The  job  had 
been  well  done,  too,  for  she  came  off  with  her  stern 
down  stream,  which  made  it  comparatively  easy  for 
Blackmore  to  check  her  way  with  his  line,  even  half- 
filled  as  she  was. 

Whether  he  failed  to  recover  as  the  boat  was  swept 
away,  or  whether  he  lost  his  balance  in  avoiding  en- 
tanglement in  the  line,  Andy  was  not  quite  sure.  His 
first  recollection  after  releasing  the  boat,  he  said,  was 
of  floundering  in  the  water  and  of  finding  that  his 
first  kick  or  two  did  not  strike  bottom.  The  thing 
that  is  always  possible  when  a  man  has  lifted  off  a 
boat  in  a  swift  current  had  happened :  he  had  lost  his 
footing,  and  in  just  about  the  one  worst  place  in  the 
whole  Columbia. 

Blackmore,  dragged  down  the  bank  after  his  floun- 
dering boat,  was  not  in  a  position  where  he  could 
throw  the  end  of  his  line  to  any  purpose.  I  waded 
in  and  reached  out  my  pike-pole,  but  Andy's  back 
was  to  it  the  only  time  he  came  within  grabbing  dis- 
tance. The  only  thing  that  saved  him  was  luck — the 
fact  that  the  current  at  the  point  he  lost  his  footing 
did  not  swirl  directly  into  the  main  chute,  but  did  a 
little  double-shuffle  of  its  own  along  the  side  of  an 
eddy  before  taking  the  big  leap.  Hooking  into  the 
solid  green  water  of  that  eddy,  Andy  found  himself 


122  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

a  toehold,  and  presently  clambered  out.  He  had  not 
swallowed  any  water,  and  did  not  seem  much  chilled 
or  winded.  A  violent  sickness  of  the  stomach,  where 
the  cold  had  arrested  digestive  operations,  was  about 
the  only  ill  effect.  What  seemed  to  annoy  him  most 
was  the  fact  that  all  of  his  pockets  were  turned  wrong- 
side-out,  with  all  of  their  contents — save  only  his 
watch,  which  had  been  secured  by  a  thong — missing. 
Blackmore  nodded  grimly  to  me  as  he  came  up  after 
securing  the  boat.  "Now  perhaps  you'll  believe  what 
I  told  3'ou  about  the  old  Columbia  picking  pockets," 
he  said  dryly. 

Roos  came  down  complaining  that  he  had  been  too 
far  away  to  pick  up  anj^  details  of  the  show  even  with 
his  "six-inch"  lens  and  cursing  his  luck  for  not  having 
been  set  up  closer  at  hand.  Considering  what  he  had 
missed,  I  thought  he  showed  unwonted  delicacy  in 
not  asking  Blackmore  and  Andy  to  stage  it  over 
again  for  him. 

Bailing  out  the  boat,  we  found  one  oar  missing,  but 
this  we  subsequently  recovered  from  an  eddy  below. 
That  left  our  net  loss  for  the  mishap  only  the  con- 
tents of  Andy's  pockets  and  the  picture  Roos  did  not 
get.  Some  might  have  figured  in  the  extra  ration  of 
rum  Andy  drew  to  straighten  out  the  kinks  of  his 
outraged  stomach;  but  that  seemed  hardly  the  sport- 
ing way  to  look  at  it,  especially  with  our  prospects  in 
the  drink  line  being  what  they  were. 

The  portage  at  the  fall  proved  a  mighty  stiff  bit  of 
hard  labour.  It  was  one  thing  to  skid  the  boat  along 
on  the  pine  needles  at  Beavermouth  with  a  couple  of 
dozen  men  pushing  it,  and  quite  another  for  three 


"shooting"  the  first  bit  of  lining  at  surprise 
RAPIDS  {above) 

THE  CAMP  WHERE  THE  ROAR  OF  THE  RAPIDS  DEAFENED  US  (ce^f/'e) 
WHERE  STEINHOF  WAS  DROWNED    (below) 


\V  .                      1 

"""^    ^1 

^  M 

^^H^A-   -.■<.  ^  -Im^^ 

pH 

'•    S 

.*/  .^.^ 

'"■■■' ^■l^  .^ 

^^^ 

w 

WHERE   ANDY   JUST   MISSED  DROWNING   IN   SURPRISE 

RAPIDS  {above) 

LOOKING  THROUGH   THE  PINES  AT  SURPRISE  RAPIDS    {centre) 
HEAD  OF  SECOND  FALL  OF  SURPRISE  RAPIDS   {below) 


THROUGH  SURPRISE  RAPIDS      123 

men  to  take  it  out  of  the  water,  lift  it  over  forty  or 
fifty  feet  of  boulders,  and  put  it  back  into  the  river 
again.  By  the  free  use  of  rollers — cut  from  young 
firs — we  managed,  however,  Roos  cranking  his  camera 
through  all  of  the  operation  and  telling  us  to  "Make 
it  snappy!"  and  not  to  be  "foot-hogs."  Almost  worse 
than  portaging  the  boat  was  the  unspeakably  toil- 
some task  of  packing  the  outfit  over  the  boulders  for 
a  couple  of  hundred  yards  to  where  there  was  a  quiet 
spot  to  load  again.  Every  step  had  to  be  balanced 
for,  and  even  then  one  was  down  on  his  knees  half  the 
time.  With  my  numerous  bad  joints — there  are  but 
three  from  shoulder  to  heel  that  had  not  been  sprained 
or  dislocated  from  two  to  a  dozen  times — this  boulder 
clambering  work  was  the  only  thing  in  connection 
with  the  whole  voyage  that  I  failed  to  enjoy. 

A  half  mile  run  with  an  eight-mile  current  took  us 
to  the  head  of  the  second  fall,  all  but  the  first  hundred 
yards  of  which  had  to  be  lined.  Landing  this  time  on 
the  west  bank,  we  worked  the  boat  down  without  much 
difficulty  past  the  jutting  point  where  the  line  of 
Steinhoff' s  boat  had  parted.  Blackmore  had  hoped  to 
line  her  all  the  way  down  without  unloading,  but  the 
last  fifty  yards  before  the  cascade  tumbled  into  the 
big  whirlpool  were  so  thickly  studded  with  rocks  along 
the  bank  that  he  finally  decided  not  to  risk  it.  As 
there  were  thirty  or  forty  feet  of  deep  pools  and 
eddies  between  the  rocks  on  which  she  was  stuck  and 
the  nearest  stretch  of  unsubmerged  boulders,  unload- 
ing was  a  particularly  awkward  piece  of  wOrk. 
Finally  everything  was  shifted  out  onto  a  flat-topped 
rock,  and  Roos  and  I  were  left  to  get  this  ashore 


124  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

while  Andy  and  Blackmore  completed  lining  down. 
It  was  an  especially  nice  job,  taking  the  boat  down 
that  last  steep  pitch  into  the  big  whirlpool  and  then 
working  her  round  a  huge  square-faced  rock  to  a 
quiet  eddy,  and  I  should  greatly  like  to  have  seen  it. 
Unluckily,  what  with  stumbling  over  hidden  boulders 
and  being  down  with  my  nose  in  the  water  half  of  the 
time,  and  the  thin  blue  mist  that  hovered  round  me 
the  rest  of  the  time  from  what  I  said  as  a  consequence 
of  stumbling,  I  could  only  guess  at  the  finesse  and 
highly  technical  skill  with  which  the  difficult  opera- 
tion was  accomplished.  The  worst  part  appeared  to 
be  getting  her  down  the  fall.  Once  clear  of  the  sub- 
merged rocks,  Blackmore  seemed  to  make  the  whirl- 
pool do  his  work  for  him.  Poised  on  a  projecting  log 
of  the  jam  packed  on  top  of  the  jutting  rock,  he  paid 
out  a  hundred  feet  of  line  and  let  the  racing  swirl  of 
the  spinning  pool  carry  the  boat  far  out  beyond  all 
obstructions.  Then,  gently  and  delicately  as  if  play- 
ing a  salmon  on  a  trout  rod,  he  nursed  her  into  an 
eddy  and  simply  coiled  his  line  and  let  the  back- 
setting current  carry  her  in  to  the  bit  of  sandy  beach 
where  he  wanted  to  tie  her  up  for  the  night.  It  takes 
a  lifetime  of  swift-water  experience  to  master  the 
intricacies  of  an  operation  like  that. 

It  was  still  early  in  the  afternoon,  but  with  a  thick 
mist  falling  Blackmore  thought  best  to  stop  where  we 
were.  The  next  available  camping  place  was  below 
the  half-mile-long  third  cascade,  and  no  old  river  man 
likes  to  go  into  a  rapid  when  the  visibility  is  poor. 
We  pitched  the  tent  in  a  hole  cut  out  of  the  thick- 
growing  woods  on  a  low  bench  at  the  inner  angle  of 


THROUGH  SURPRISE  RAPIDS      125 

the  bend.  Everything  was  soaking  wet,  but  it  was 
well  back  from  the  falls,  and  for  the  first  time  in  two 
days  we  were  able  to  talk  to  each  other  without  shout- 
ing. Not  that  we  did  so,  however;  from  sheer  force 
of  habit  we  continued  roaring  into  each  other's  ears 
for  a  week  or  more  yet. 

The  great  pile  of  logs  on  top  of  the  flat-topped 
rock  above  the  whirlpool  had  fascinated  me  from  the 
first.  Over  a  hundred  feet  square,  forty  feet  high, 
and  packed  as  though  by  a  titanic  hydraulic  press,  it 
must  have  contained  thousands  and  thousands  of 
cords  of  wood.  On  Blackmore's  positive  assurance 
as  a  timberman  that  there  was  nothing  in  the  pile  of 
any  value  for  lumber,  even  in  the  improbable  con- 
tingency that  a  flood  would  ever  carry  it  beyond  the 
big  drifts  of  Kinbasket  Lake,  I  decided  to  make  a 
bonfire  of  it.  Never  had  I  had  such  an  opportunity, 
both  on  the  score  of  the  sheer  quantity  of  combustible 
and  the  spectacular  setting  for  illumination. 

The  whirlpool  was  whouf-wJioufing  greedily  as  it 
wolfed  the  whole  cascade  when  I  clambered  up  just 
before  dark  to  touch  off  my  beacon.  It  was  fairly 
dry  at  the  base,  and  a  pile  of  crisp  shavings  off  a  slab 
from  some  distant  up-river  sawmill  caught  quickly. 
From  a  spark  of  red  flickering  dimly  through  the 
mist  when  we  sat  down  to  supper,  this  had  grown  to  a 
roaring  furnace  by  the  time  we  had  relaxed  to  pipes 
and  cigarettes.  An  hour  later  the  flames  had  eaten  a 
clear  chimney  up  through  the  jam  and  the  red  light 
from  their  leaping  tips  was  beginning  to  drive  back 
the  encompassing  darkness.  Roos,  who  had  read 
about  India,  thought  it  would  have  been  fine  if  we 


126  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

only  had  a  few  widows  to  cast  themselves  on  the  flam- 
ing pyre  and  commit  suttee.  Andy  and  Blackmore, 
both  sentimental  bachelors,  were  a  unit  in  maintain- 
ing that  it  would  be  a  shame  to  waste  good  widows 
that  way,  especially  on  the  practically  widowless  Big 
Bend.  All  three  were  arguing  the  point  rather  heat- 
edly when  they  crawled  into  their  blankets.  For 
myself,  with  a  vision  of  the  wonder  about  to  unroll 
impinging  on  my  brain,  I  could  not  think  of  turning 
in  for  hours  yet. 

By  ten  o'clock  the  pile  was  well  alight  underneath, 
but  it  was  not  until  nearly  midnight,  when  the  mist 
had  turned  to  snow  and  a  strong  wind  had  sprung 
up,  that  it  was  blazing  full  strength.  I  hardly  know 
what  would  have  been  the  direction  of  the  wind  in 
the  upper  air,  but,  cupped  in  the  embrasure  of  the 
bend,  it  was  sucking  round  and  round,  like  the  big 
whirlpool,  only  more  fitfully  and  with  an  upward 
rather  than  a  downward  pull.  Now  it  would  drag 
the  leaping  flame-column  a  hundred  feet  in  the  air, 
twisting  it  into  lambent  coils  and  fining  the  tip  down 
to  a  sharp  point,  like  that  of  the  Avenging  Angel's 
Sword  of  Fire  in  the  old  Biblical  prints,  now  sweep  it 
out  in  a  shivering  sheet  above  the  whirlpool,  now 
swing  it  evenly  round  and  round  as  though  the  flame, 
arrow-pointed  and  attenuated,  were  the  radium- 
coated  hand  of  a  Gargantuan  clock  being  swiftly  re- 
volved in  the  dark. 

But  the  wonder  of  wonders  was  less  the  fire  itself 
than  the  marvellous  transformations  wrought  by  the 
light  it  threw.  And  the  staggering  contrasts!  The 
illuminated  snow  clouds  drifting  along  the  frosted- 


THROUGH  SURPRISE  RAPIDS      127 

pink  curtain  of  the  tree-clad  mountain  walls  made  a 
roseate  fairyland;  even  the  foam  covered  sweep  of 
the  cascade,  its  roar  drowned  in  the  sharp  crackle  of 
the  flames,  was  softened  and  smoothened  until  it 
seemed  to  billow  like  the  sunset-flushed  canvas  of  a 
ship  becalmed :  but  the  whirlpool,  its  sinister  character 
only  accentuated  by  the  conflict  of  cross-shadows  and 
reflections,  was  a  veritable  Pit  of  Damnation,  choking 
and  coughing  as  it  swirled  and  rolled  in  streaky  coils 
of  ox-blood,  in  fire-stabbed  welters  of  fluid  coal-tar. 

Wrapped  in  my  hooded  duffle  coat,  I  paced  the 
snow-covered  mosr.  and  exulted  in  the  awesome  spec- 
tacle until  long  after  midnight.  I  have  never  envied 
l^J'ero  very  poignantly  since.  Given  a  fiddle  and  a 
few  Christians,  I  would  have  had  all  that  was  his  on 
the  greatest  night  of  his  life — and  then  some.  Father 
Tiber  never  had  a  whirlpool  like  mine,  even  on  the  day 
Horatius  swam  it  "heavy  with  his  armour  and  spent 
with  changing  blows." 

The  next  morning,  though  too  heavily  overcast  for 
pictures,  was  still  clear  enough  to  travel.  The  head 
riffles  of  the  third  fall  of  Surprise  Rapids  began  a 
little  below  our  camp,  so  that  we  started  lining  almost 
immediately.  Three  or  four  times  we  pulled  across  the 
river,  running  short  stretches  and  lining  now  down 
one  side  and  now  the  other.  There  was  not  so  great 
a  rate  of  drop  as  at  the  first  and  second  falls,  but  the 
whole  stream  was  choked  with  barely  submerged  rocks 
and  lining  was  difficult  on  account  of  the  frequent 
chffs. 

It  was  about  half  way  down  that  I  all  but  messed 
things  up  by  failing  to  get  into  action  quickly  enough 


128  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

at  a  crossing.  The  fault,  in  a  way,  was  Blackmore's, 
because  of  his  failure  to  tell  me  in  advance  what  was 
expected,  and  then — when  the  order  had  to  be  passed 
instantly — for  standing  rather  too  much  on  ceremony 
in  the  manner  of  passing  it.  We  were  about  to  pull 
to  the  opposite  side  to  line  down  past  a  riffle  which 
Blackmore  reckoned  too  rough  to  risk  running. 
There  was  about  a  ten-mile  current,  and  it  would 
have  required  the  smartest  kind  of  a  get-away  and 
the  hardest  kind  of  pulling  to  make  the  other  bank 
without  being  carried  down  onto  the  riffle.  The  boat 
was  headed  up-stream,  and,  as  Blackmore  had  not 
told  me  he  intended  to  cross,  I  took  it  for  granted  he 
was  going  to  run.  So,  when  Roos  shoved  off  and 
jumped  in,  I  rested  on  my  oar  in  order  that  Andy 
could  bring  the  boat  sharply  round  and  head  it  down 
stream.  Blackmore's  excited  yell  was  the  first  inti- 
mation I  had  that  anything  was  wrong.  "Pull  like 
hell!    You!   .    .    .   Mister  Freeman!" 

That  "Mister,"  and  his  momentary  pause  before 
uttering  it,  defeated  the  purpose  of  the  order.  I 
pulled  all  right,  and  so  hard  that  my  oar-blade  picked 
up  a  very  sizable  hunk  of  river  and  flung  it  in  Black- 
more's face.  That  upset  my  balance,  and  I  could  not 
recover  quickly  enough  to  keep  the  boat's  head  to  the 
current.  With  characteristic  presence  of  mind, 
Blackmore  changed  tactics  instantly.  "Got  to  chance 
it  now!"  he  shouted,  and  threw  such  a  pull  onto  his 
steering  paddle  that  the  handle  bent  to  more  than 
half  a  right  angle  where  he  laid  it  over  the  gunwale. 
There  was  one  jutting  rock  at  the  head  of  the  riffle 
that  had  to  be  missed;  the  rest  was  all  a  matter  of 


THROUGH  SURPRISE  RAPIDS      129 

whether  or  not  the  next  couple  of  hundred  yards  of 
submerged  boulders  were  deeply  enough  covered  to 
let  us  pass  over  them.  There  was  no  way  of  avoiding 
them,  no  chance  to  lay  a  course  between  them. 

Blackmore  was  a  bit  wilder  about  the  eyes  than  I 
had  seen  him  before;  but  he  had  stopped  swearing 
and  his  mouth  was  set  in  a  hard,  determined  line. 
Andy,  with  chesty  grunts,  was  fairly  flailing  the 
water  with  swift,  short-arm  strokes.  I  did  not  need 
to  be  told  to  refrain  from  pulling  in  order  that  the 
others  could  swing  her  head  as  far  toward  the  west 
bank  as  possible  before  the  rock  was  reached.  In- 
stead, I  held  ready  for  the  one  quick  backing  stroke 
that  would  be  called  for  in  the  event  a  collision  seemed 
imminent  at  the  last  moment.  It  was  the  wave  thrown 
off  by  the  rock  itself  that  helped  us  most  when  the 
showdown  came.  Shooting  by  the  jagged  barrier  so 
close  that  Andy  could  have  fended  with  his  hand,  the 
boat  plunged  over  a  short,  sharp  pitch  and  hit  the 
white  water  with  a  bang. 

That  was  by  long  odds  the  roughest  stuff  we  had 
been  into  so  far.  The  waves  were  curling  up  well 
above  our  heads,  and  every  one  we  hit  left  a  foot  or 
two  of  its  top  with  us — solid  green  water,  most  of  it, 
that  began  accumulating  rather  alarmingly  in  the 
bottom  of  the  boat.  There  was  no  regularity  in  the 
way  they  ran,  either.  One  would  come  mushrooming 
fairly  over  the  bows,  another  would  flop  aboard  over 
the  beam,  and  every  now  and  then  a  wild  side-winder, 
missing  its  spring  at  the  forward  part  of  the  boat, 
would  dash  a  shower  of  spray  over  the  quarter.  From 
the  bank  she  must  have  been  pretty  well  out  of  sight 


130  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

most  of  the  time,  for  I  often  saw  spray  thro^vn  ten 
or  fifteen  feet  to  either  side  and  twice  as  far  astern. 
All  hands  were  drenched  from  the  moment  we  struck 
the  first  comber,  of  course,  which  was  doubtless  why 
a  wail  from  Roos  that  the  water  was  going  down  his 
neck  seemed  to  strike  Blackmore  as  a  bit  superfluous. 
"Inside  or  outside  your  neck?"  he  roared  back,  adding 
that  if  it  was  the  former  the  flow  could  be  checked  by 
the  simple  and  natural  expedient  of  keeping  the 
mouth  shut.  Very  properly,  our  "skipper"  had  the 
feeling  that,  in  a  really  tight  place,  all  the  talking 
necessary  for  navigation  should  be  done  from  the 
"bridge,"  and  that  "extraneous"  comment  should  be 
held  over  to  smooth  water. 

Before  we  had  run  a  hundred  yards  the  anxious  look 
on  Blackmore's  face  had  given  way  to  one  of  relief 
and  exultation.  "There's  more  water  over  the  rocks 
than  I  reckoned,"  he  shouted.  "Going  to  run  right 
through."  And  run  we  did,  all  of  the  last  mile  or 
more  of  Surprise  Rapids  and  right  on  through  the 
still  swift  but  comparatively  quiet  water  below.  Here 
we  drifted  with  the  current  for  a  ways,  while  all  hands 
turned  to  and  bailed.  I  took  this,  the  first  occasion 
that  had  offered,  to  assure  Blackmore  that  he  needn't 
go  to  the  length  of  calling  me  "jNIister"  in  the  future 
when  he  had  urgent  orders  to  give,  and  incidentally 
apologized  for  getting  off  on  the  wrong  foot  at  the 
head  of  the  first  rapid.  "Since  that  worked  out  to 
save  us  half  a  mile  of  darn  dirty  lining  and  two  or 
three  hours  of  time,"  he  replied  with  a  grin,  "I  guess 
we  won't  worry  about  it  this  crack,  blister — I 
mean.  Freeman.     Mebbe  I  better  get  used  to  saying 


THROUGH  SURPRISE  RAPIDS      131 

it  that  way  'gainst  when  I'll  need  to  spit  it  out 
quick." 

It  was  a  pleasant  run  from  the  foot  of  Surprise 
Rapids  down  to  Kinbasket  Lake,  or  at  least  it  was 
pleasant  until  the  rain  set  in  again.  There  is  a  fall 
of  sixty-four  feet  in  the  sixteen  miles — most  of  it  in 
the  first  ten.  It  was  a  fine  swift  current,  with  a 
number  of  riffles  but  no  bad  water  at  any  point.  It 
was  good  to  be  free  for  a  while  from  the  tension  which 
is  never  absent  when  working  in  really  rough  water, 
and  I  have  no  doubt  that  Blackmore  felt  better  about 
it  than  any  of  the  rest  of  us.  Surprise  was  his  espe- 
cial bete  noir,  and  he  assured  me  that  he  had  never 
come  safely  through  it  without  swearing  never  to 
tackle  it  again.  Roos,  drying  out  in  the  bow  like  a 
tabby  licking  her  wet  coat  smooth  after  being  rained 
on,  sang  "Green  River"  all  the  way,  and  I  tried  to 
train  Andy  to  pull  in  time  to  the  rhythm  and  join  in 
the  chorus.  As  the  chorus  had  much  about  drink  in 
it,  it  seemed  only  fitting — considering  what  was  wait- 
ing for  us  at  Canoe  River — that  we  should  sing  it. 
And  we  did.  "Floating  Down  the  Old  Green  River" 
became  the  "official  song"  of  that  particular  part  of 
the  voyage.     Later   .    .    .   but  why  anticipate? 

We  landed  for  lunch  about  where  the  water  began 
to  slacken  above  the  lake.  The  water  of  the  little 
stream  at  the  mouth  of  which  we  tied  up  the  boat  was 
of  a  bright  transparent  amber  in  colour.  Andy, 
sapient  of  the  woods,  thought  it  must  flow  from  a  lake 
impounded  behind  a  beaver-dam  in  the  high  moun- 
tains, and  that  the  stain  was  that  of  rotting  wood. 
Beaver  signs  were  certainly  much  in  evidence  all  over 


132  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

the  little  bench  where  we  lunched.  Several  large  Cot- 
tonwood trunks — one  of  them  all  of  two  feet  in  diam- 
eter— had  been  felled  by  the  tireless  little  engineers, 
and  we  found  a  pile  of  tooth-torn  chips  large  enough 
to  kindle  our  fire  with.  While  tea  was  boiling  Black- 
more  pulled  a  couple  of  three-pound  Dolly  Varden 
out  of  the  mouth  of  the  creek,  only  to  lose  his  hooks 
and  line  when  a  still  larger  one  connected  up  with 
them.  Roos,  who  was  under  orders  to  get  an  effective 
fishing  picture,  was  unable  to  go  into  action  with  his 
camera  on  account  of  the  poor  light. 

It  had  begun  to  rain  hard  by  the  time  we  had 
shoved  back  into  the  river  after  lunch.  There  were 
still  five  miles  to  go  to  reach  the  camping  ground 
Blackmore  had  decided  upon,  half  way  down  the  east 
side  of  Kinbasket  Lake,  just  below  INIiddle  River — 
slack  water  all  the  way.  Andy  and  I  pulled  it  in  a 
slushy  half -snow-half-rain  that  was  a  lot  wetter  and 
unpleasanter  than  the  straight  article  of  either  va- 
riety. Of  a  lake  which  is  one  of  the  loveliest  in  all  the 
world  in  the  sunlight,  nothing  was  to  be  seen  save  a 
stretch  of  grey-white,  wind-whipped  waters  beating 
upon  grey-brown  rocky  shores.  That  the  wind  and 
waves  headed  us  did  not  make  the  pulling  any  lighter, 
for  the  boat's  considerable  freeboard  gave  both  a  lot 
of  surface  to  play  upon.  The  exertion  of  rowing  kept 
Andy  and  me  warm,  however,  which  gave  us  at  least 
that  advantage  over  Roos  and  Blackmore.  Tlie  latter 
had  to  face  it  out  at  his  paddle,  but  Roos,  a  bedrag- 
gled lump  of  sodden  despair,  finally  gave  up  and 
crawled  under  the  tarpaulin  with  the  bags  of  beans 
and  bacon,  remaining  there  until  we  reached  port. 


THROUGH  SURPRISE  RAPIDS      133 

All  in  all,  I  think  that  was  the  most  miserable  camp 
I  ever  helped  to  pitch.  The  snow,  refusing  persist- 
ently either  to  harden  or  to  soften,  adhered  clingingly 
to  everything  it  touched.  We  were  two  hours  clear- 
ing a  space  for  the  tent,  setting  it  up  and  collecting 
enough  boughs  to  cushion  the  floor.  By  that  time 
pretty  nearly  everything  not  hermetically  sealed  was 
wet,  including  the  blankets  and  the  "dry"  clothes.  No 
one  but  Andy  could  have  started  a  camp-fire  under 
such  conditions,  and  no  one  but  Blackmore  could  have 
cooked  a  piping  hot  dinner  on  it.  I  forget  whether 
it  was  Roos  or  myself  who  contributed  further  to  save 
the  day.  Anyhow,  it  was  one  of  the  two  of  us  that 
suggested  cooking  a  can  of  plum-pudding  in  about  its 
own  bulk  of  "thirty  per  overproof"  rum.  That  lent 
the  saving  touch.  In  spite  of  a  leaking  tent  and  wet 
blankets,  the  whole  four  of  us  turned  in  singing  "End 
of  a  Perfect  Day"  and  "Old  Green  River."  The 
latter  was  prophetic.  A  miniature  one — coming 
through  the  roof  of  the  tent — had  the  range  of  the 
back  of  my  neck  for  most  of  the  night. 


CHAPTER  VII 

II.      BUKNING    THE    BEND 

Kinhashet  Lake  and  Rapids 

It  continued  slushing  all  night  and  most  of  the  next 
day,  keeping  us  pretty  close  to  camp.  Andy,  like  the 
good  housewife  he  was,  kept  snugging  up  eveiy  time 
he  got  a  chance,  so  that  things  assumed  a  homelier 
and  cheerier  aspect  as  the  day  wore  on.  I  clambered 
for  a  couple  of  miles  down  the  rocky  eastern  bank  of 
the  lake  in  the  forenoon.  The  low-hanging  clouds 
still  obscured  the  mountains,  but  underfoot  I  found 
unending  interest  in  the  astonishing  variety  of  drift 
corralled  by  this  remarkable  catch-all  of  the  upper 
Columbia.  The  main  accumulation  of  flotsam  and 
jetsam  was  above  our  camp,  but  even  among  the  rocks 
I  chanced  onto  almost  everything  one  can  imagine, 
from  a  steel  rail — with  the  ties  that  had  served  to 
float  it  down  still  spiked  to  it — to  a  fragment  of  a 
vacuum-cleaner.  What  Roos  called  "the  human 
touch"  was  furnished  by  an  enormous  uprooted 
spruce,  on  which  some  amorous  lumber- jack  had 
been  pouring  out  his  love  through  the  blade  of  his 
axe.  This  had  taken  the  form  of  a  two-feet-in-di- 
ameter  "bleeding  heart"  pierced  by  an  arrow.  Inside 
the  roughly  hewn  "pericardium"  were  the  initials  "K. 
N."  and  "P.  R.,"  with  the  date  "July  4,  1910."  One 
couldn't  be  quite  sure  whether  the  arrow  stood  for 

134 


KINBASKET  LAKE  AND  RAPIDS     135 

a  heart  quake  or  a  heart  break.  Andy,  who  was  senti- 
mental and  inchned  to  put  woman  in  the  abstract  on 
a  pedestal,  thought  it  was  merely  a  heart  quake;  but 
Blackmore,  who  had  been  something  of  a  gallant  in 
his  day,  and  therefore  inclined  to  cynicism  as  he 
neared  the  sear  and  yellow  leaf,  was  sure  it  was  heart 
break — that  the  honest  lumber- jack  had  hacked  in  the 
arrow  and  the  drops  of  blood  after  he  had  been  jilted 
by  some  jade.  Roos  wanted  to  make  a  movie  of  this 
simple  fragment  of  rustic  art,  with  me  standing  by 
and  registering  "pensive  memories,"  or  something  of 
the  kind;  but  I  managed  to  discourage  him  by  the 
highly  technical  argument  that  it  would  impair  the 
"continuity"  of  the  "sportsmanship"  which  was  the 
prime  motif  of  the  present  picture. 

Blackmore  piloted  me  up  to  the  main  area  of  drift 
in  the  afternoon.  It  occupied  a  hundred  acres  or  more 
of  sand  and  mud  flats  which  constituted  the  lower  part 
of  the  extensive  delta  deposited  on  the  edge  of  the 
lake  by  the  waters  of  the  good-sized  stream  of  Middle 
River.  At  a  first  glance  it  seemed  nothing  more  than 
a  great  wilderness  of  tree  trunks — prostrate,  up- 
ended, woVen  and  packed  together — extending  for 
hundreds  of  yards  below  high-water-mark.  It  was  be- 
tween these  logs  that  the  smaller  things  had  lodged. 
There  were  a  number  of  boats,  not  greatly  damaged, 
and  fragments  enough  to  have  reconstructed  a  dozen 
more.  I  am  convinced  that  a  half  day's  search  would 
have  discovered  the  material  for  building  and  furnish- 
ing a  house,  though  carpets  and  wall  paper  would 
hardly  have  been  all  one  could  desire.  I  even  found 
a  curling  iron — closely  clasped  by  the  bent  nail  upon 


13G  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

wliich  it  had  been  hung  on  the  log  of  a  cabin — and 
a  corset.  The  hitter  seemed  hardly  worth  salving,  as 
it  appeared — according  to  Blackmore — to  be  a  "mili- 
tary model"  of  a  decade  or  so  back,  and  the  steel-work 
was  badly  rusted. 

However,  it  was  not  gewgaws  or  house-furnishing 
Ave  were  after.  One  could  hardly  be  expected  to 
slither  a))out  in  soft  slush  for  secondhand  things  of 
that  kind.  I  gave  a  great  glad  whoop  at  my  first 
sight  of  a  silt-submerged  cask,  only  to  find  the  head 
missing  and  nothing  but  mud  in  it.  So,  too,  my  sec- 
ond and  third.  Then  it  was  Blackmore  who  gave  the 
"View  Halloo,"  and  my  heart  gave  a  mighty  leap. 
His  treasure  trove  had  the  head  intact,  and  even  the 
bung  in  situ.  But  alas!  the  latter  had  become  slightly 
started,  and  although  the  contents  had  botli  smell  and 
colour  they  were  so»  heavily  impregnated  with  river 
mud  that  they  would  hardly  have  been  deemed  fit  for 
consumption  except  in  New  York  and  California,  and 
not  worth  the  risk  of  smuggling  even  there.  That 
cask  was  the  high-water-mark  of  our  luck.  Several 
others  had  the  old  familiar  smell,  and  that  was  all. 
But  there  is  no  doubt  in  the  world  that  there  is  whisky 
in  that  drift  pile — hundreds  of  gallons  of  it,  and  some 
very  old.  Blackmore  swears  to  that,  and  I  never 
knew  him  to  lie — about  serious  matters,  I  mean.  In 
hunting  and  trapping  yarns  a  man  is  expected  to  draw 
a  long  bead.  I  pass  on  this  undeniably  valuable  in- 
formation to  any  one  that  cares  to  profit  by  it.  There 
are  no  strings  attached.  But  of  course  ...  in  the 
event  of  success  .  .  .  Pasadena  always  finds 
me!  .  .  . 


KINBASKET  LAKE  AND  RAPIDS     137 

We  did  have  one  find,  though,  that  was  so  remarka- 
ble as  to  be  worth  all  the  trouble  and  disappointment 
of  our  otherwise  futile  search.  This  was  a  road- 
bridge,  with  instinct.  The  manner  in  which  this  had 
been  displayed  was  so  astonishing  as  to  be  almost 
beyond  belief;  indeed,  I  would  hesitate  about  setting 
down  the  facts  had  I  not  a  photograph  to  prove  them. 
This  bridge  was  perhaps  sixty  feet  in  length,  and  had 
doubtless  been  carried  away  by  a  freshet  from  some 
tributary  of  the  upper  river  which  it  had  spanned. 
This  was  probably  somewhere  between  Golden  and 
Windermere,  so  that  it  had  run  a  hundred  miles  or 
more  of  swift  water,  including  the  falls  of  Surprise 
Rapids,  without  losing  more  than  a  few  planks.  This 
in  itself  was  remarkable  enough,  but  nothing  at  all 
to  the  fact*  that,  when  it  finally  decided  it  had  come 
far  enough,  the  sagacious  structure  had  gone  and 
planked  itself  down  squarely  across  another  stream. 
It  was  still  a  bridge  in  fact  as  well  as  in  form.  It  had 
actually  saved  my  feet  from  getting  wet  when  I 
rushed  to  Blackmore's  aid  in  up-ending  the  cask  of 
mud-diluted  whisky.  My  photograph  plainly  shows 
Blackmore  standing  on  the  bridge,  with  the  water 
flowing  directly  beneath  him.  It  would  have  been  a 
more  comprehensive  and  convincing  picture  if  there 
had  been  light  enough  for  a  snapshot.  As  it  was,  I 
had  to  set  up  on  a  stump,  and  in  a  position  which 
showed  less  of  both  stream  and  bridge  than  I  might 
have  had  from  a  better  place.  I  swear  (and  so  does 
Blackmore)  that  we  didn't  place  the  bridge  where  it 
was.  It  was  much  too  large  for  that.  Roos  wanted 
to  shoot  the  whole  three  of  us  standing  on  it  and 


138  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

registering  "unbounded  wonderment,"  but  the  light 
was  never  right  for  it  up  to  the  morning  of  our  de- 
2)arture,  and  then  there  wasn't  time. 

It  rained  and  snowed  all  that  night  and  most  of  the 
following  day.  During  the  afternoon  of  the  latter  the 
clouds  broke  up  twice  or  thrice,  and  through  rifts  in 
the  drifting  wracks  we  had  transient  glimpses  of  the 
peaks  and  glaciers  of  the  Selkirks  gleaming  above 
the  precipitous  western  walls  of  the  lake.  The  most 
conspicuous  feature  of  the  sky-line  was  the  three- 
peaked  "Trident,"  rising  almost  perpendicularly 
from  a  glittering  field  of  glacial  ice  and  impaling 
great  masses  of  pendant  cumulo-nimhi  on  its  splin- 
tered prongs.  Strings  of  lofty  glacier-set  summits 
marked  the  line  of  the  backbone  of  the  Selkirks  to 
southeast  and  northwest,  each  of  them  sending  down 
rain-swollen  torrents  to  tumble  into  the  lake  in 
cataracts  and  cascades.  Behind,  or  east  of  us,  we 
knew  the  Rockies  reared  a  similar  barrier  of  snow 
and  ice,  but  this  was  cut  off  from  our  vision  by  the 
more  imminent  lake-wall  under  which  we  were 
camped.  If  Kinbasket  Lake  is  ever  made  accessible 
to  the  tourist  its  fame  will  reach  to  the  end  of  the 
earth.  This  is  a  consmnmation  which  may  be  effected 
in  the  event  the  Canadian  Pacific  wipes  out  Surprise 
Rapids  with  its  hydro-electric  project  dam  and  backs 
up  a  lake  to  Beavermouth.  The  journey  to  this  spot 
of  incomparable  beauty  could  then  be  made  soft 
enough  to  suit  all  but  the  most  effete. 

A  torrential  rain,  following  a  warm  southerly 
breeze  which  sprang  up  in  tlie  middle  of  the  afternoon, 
lowered  the  dense  cloud-curtain  again,  and  shortly, 


KINBASKET  LAKE  AND  RAPIDS     139 

from  somewhere  behind  the  scenes,  came  the  raucous 
rumble  and  roar  of  a  great  avalanche.  Blackmore's 
practised  ear  led  him  to  pronounce  it  a  slide  of  both 
earth  and  snow,  and  to  locate  it  somewhere  on  Trident 
Creek,  straight  across  the  lake  from  our  camp.  He 
proved  to  be  right  on  both  counts.  When  the  clouds 
lifted  again  at  sunset,  a  long  yellow  scar  gashed  the 
shoulder  of  the  mountain  half  way  up  Trident  Creek 
to  the  glacier,  and  the  clear  stream  from  the  latter 
had  completely  disappeared.  Blackmore  said  it  had 
been  dammed  up  by  the  slide,  and  that  there  would 
be  all  hell  popping  when  it  broke  through. 

Scouting  around  for  more  boughs  to  soften  his  bed, 
Roos,  just  before  supper,  chanced  upon  Steinhoff's 
grave.  It  was  under  a  small  pine,  not  fifty  feet  from 
our  tent,  but  so  hidden  by  the  dense  undergrowth 
that  it  had  escaped  our  notice  for  two  days.  It  was 
marked  only  by  a  fragment  split  from  the  stern  of 
a  white-painted  boat  nailed  horizontally  on  the  pine 
trunk  and  with  the  single  word  "Steinhoff"  carved 
in  rude  capitals.  At  one  corner,  in  pencil,  was  an 
inscription  stating  that  the  board  had  been  put  up 
in  May,  1920,  by  Joe  French  and  Leo  Tennis.  With 
the  golden  sunset  light  streaming  through  the  trees, 
Roos,  always  strong  for  "pathetic  human  touches"  to 
serve  as  a  sombre  background  for  his  Mack  Sennett 
stuff,  could  not  resist  the  opportunity  for  a  picture. 
Andy  and  Blackmore  and  I  were  to  come  climbing 
up  to  the  grave  from  the  lake,  read  the  inscription, 
and  then  look  at  each  other  and  shake  our  heads 
ominously,  as  though  it  was  simply  a  matter  of  time 
imtil  we,  too,  should  fall  prey  to  the  implacable  river. 


140  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

I  refused  straightaway,  on  the  ground  that  I  had 
signed  up  to  act  the  part  of  a  hght  comedy  sportsman 
and  not  a  heavy  mourner.  Blackmore  and  Andy 
were  more  amenable.  In  rehearsal,  however,  the  ex- 
pressions on  their  honest  faces  were  so  wooden  and 
embarrassed  that  Roos  finally  called  me  up  to  stand 
out  of  range  and  "say  something  to  make  'em  look 
natural."  I  refrain  from  recording  what  I  said;  but 
I  still  maintain  that  shot  was  an  interruption  of  the 
"continuity"  of  my  "gentleman-sportsman"  picture. 
I  have  not  yet  heard  if  it  survived  the  studio  surgery. 
Shortly  before  dark,  Andy,  going  down  to  look  at 
his  set-line,  found  a  three-foot  ling  or  fresh-water  cod 
floundering  on  the  end  of  it.  Roos  persuaded  him  to 
keep  it  over  night  so  that  the  elusive  "fishing  picture" 
might  be  made  the  following  morning  in  case  the  light 
was  good.  As  there  were  five  or  six  inches  of  water 
in  the  bottom  of  the  boat,  Andy  threw  the  ling  in  there 
for  the  night  in  preference  to  picketing  him  out  on  a 
line.  There  was  plenty  of  water  to  have  given  the 
husky  shovel-nose  ample  room  to  circulate  with  com- 
fort if  only  he  had  been  content  to  take  it  easy  and 
not  wax  temperamental.  Doubtless  it  was  his  immi- 
nent movie  engagement  that  brought  on  his  attack  of 
flightiness.  At  any  rate,  he  tried  to  burrow  under  a 
collapsible  sheet- iron  stove  (which,  preferring  to  do 
with  a  camp-fire,  we  had  left  in  the  boat)  and  got 
stuck.  The  forward  five  pounds  of  him  had  water 
enough  to  keep  alive  in,  but  in  the  night — when  it 
cleared  off  and  turned  cold — his  tail,  which  was  bent 
up  sharply  under  a  thwart,  froze  stiff  at  almost  right 
angles.    But  I  am  getting  ahead  of  my  story. 


KINBASKET  LAKE  AND  RAPIDS     141 

The  next  morning,  the  sixth  of  October,  broke  bril- 
liantly clear,  with  the  sun  gilding  the  prongs  of  the 
"Trident"  and  throwing  the  whole  snowy  line  of  the 
Selkirks  in  dazzling  relief  against  a  deep  turquoise 
sky.  Blackmore,  keen  for  an  early  start,  so  as  not 
to  be  rushed  in  working  down  through  the  dreaded 
"Twenty-One-Mile"  Rapids  to  Canoe  River,  rooted 
us  out  at  daybreak  and  began  breaking  camp  before 
breakfast.  He  had  reckoned  without  the  "fishing  pic- 
ture," however.  Roos  wanted  bright  sunlight  for  it, 
claiming  he  was  under  special  instructions  to  make 
something  sparkling  and  snappy.  All  through  break- 
fast he  coached  me  on  the  intricate  details  of  the  ac- 
tion. "Make  him  put  up  a  stiff  fight,"  he  admonished 
through  a  mouthful  of  flapjack.  "Of  course  he  won't 
fight,  'cause  he  ain't  that  kind;  but  if  you  jerk  and 
wiggle  your  pole  just  right  it'll  make  it  look  like  he 
was.  That's  what  a  real  actor's  for — making  things 
look  like  they  is  when  they  ain't.  Got  me?"  Then 
we  went  down  and  discovered  that  poor  half-frozen 
fish  with  the  eight-point  alteration  of  the  continuity 
of  his  back-bone. 

The  ling  or  fresh-water  cod  has  an  underhung, 
somewhat  shark-like  mouth,  not  unsuggestive  of  the 
new  moon  with  its  points  turned  downward.  Roos' 
mouth  took  on  a  similarly  dejected  droop  when  he 
found  the  condition  the  principal  animal  actor  in  his 
fish  picture  was  in.  But  it  was  too  late  to  give  up 
now.  Never  might  we  have  so  husky  a  fighting  fish 
ready  to  hand,  and  with  a  bright  sun  shining  on  it. 
Roos  tried  osteopathy,  applied  chiropractics  and 
Christian  Science  without  much  effect.     Our  "lead'* 


142  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

continued  as  rigid  and  unrelaxing  as  the  bushman's 
boomerang,  whose  shape  he  so  nearly  approximated. 
Then  Andy  wrought  the  miracle  with  a  simple  "lay- 
ing on  of  hands."  What  he  really  did  was  to  thaw 
out  the  frozen  rear  end  of  the  fish  by  holding  it 
between  his  big,  warm  red  Celtic  paws ;  but  the  effect 
was  as  magical  as  a  cure  at  Lourdes.  The  big  ling 
was  shortly  flopping  vigorously,  and  when  Andy 
dropped  him  into  a  bit  of  a  boulder-locked  pool  he 
went  charging  back  and  forth  at  the  rocky  barriers 
like  a  bull  at  a  gate.  Roos  almost  wept  in  his  thank- 
fulness, and  forthwith  promised  the  restorer  an  extra 
rum  ration  that  night.  Andy  grinned  his  thanks,  but 
reminded  him  that  we  ought  to  be  at  the  old  ferry  by 
night,  where  something  even  better  than  "thirty  per 
overproof"  rum  would  be  on  tap.  It  was  indeed  the 
morning  of  our  great  day.  Stimulated  by  that  inspir- 
ing thought,  I  prepared  to  outdo  myself  in  the  "fish 
picture,"  the  "set"  for  which  was  now  ready. 

Standing  on  the  stern  of  the  beached  boat,  I  made 
a  long  cast,  registering  "concentrated  eagerness." 
Then  Roos  stopped  cranking,  and  Andy  brought  the 
ling  out  and  fastened  it  to  the  end  of  my  line  with  a 
snug  but  comfortable  hitch  through  the  gills.  (We 
were  careful  not  to  hurt  him,  for  Chester's  directions 
had  admonished  especially  against  "showing  brutal- 
ity".) When  I  had  nursed  him  out  to  about  where 
my  opening  cast  had  landed,  Roos  called  "Action!" 
and  started  cranking  again.  Back  and  forth  in  wide 
sweeps  he  dashed,  while  I  registered  blended  "eager- 
ness" and  "determination,"  with  frequent  interpola- 
tions of  "consternation"  as  carefully  timed  tugs  (by 


e:  z 

of  J 

t=^   r-i 


ANDY  AND  I  PULLING  DOWN   KINBASIIKT  LAKE 


KINBASKET  LAKE  AND  RAPIDS     143 

myself)  bent  my  shivering  pole  down  to  the  water. 
When  Roos  had  enough  footage  of  "fighting,"  I 
brought  my  catch  in  close  to  the  boat  and  leered  down 
at  him,  registering  "near  triumph."  Then  I  towed 
him  ashore  and  Andy  and  Blackmore  rushed  in  to 
help  me  land  him.  After  much  struggling  (by  our- 
selves) we  brought  him  out  on  the  beach.  At  this 
juncture  I  was  supposed  to  grab  the  ling  by  the  gills 
and  hold  him  proudly  aloft,  registering  "full  triumph" 
the  while.  Andy  and  Blackmore  were  to  crowd  in, 
pat  me  on  the  back  and  beam  congratulations.  Black- 
more  was  then  to  assume  an  expression  intended  to 
convey  the  impression  that  this  was  the  hardest  fight- 
ing ling  he  had  ever  seen  caught.  All  three  of  us 
were  action  perfect  in  our  parts;  but  that  miserable 
turn-tail  of  a  ling — who  had  nothing  to  do  but  flop 
and  register  "indignant  protest" — spoiled  it  all  at 
the  last.  As  I  flung  my  prize  on  high,  a  shrill  scream 
of  "Rotten!"  from  Roos  froze  the  action  where  it  was. 
Then  I  noticed  that  what  was  supposed  to  be  a  gamy 
denizen  of  the  swift-flowing  Columbia  was  hanging 
from  my  hand  as  rigid  as  a  coupling-pin — a  bent 
coupling-pin  at  that,  for  he  had  resumed  his  former 
cold-storage  curl. 

"Rotten!"  shrieked  Roos  in  a  frenzy;  "do  it  again!" 
But  that  was  not  to  be.  For  the  "chief  actor"  the  cur- 
tain had  rung  down  for  good.  "You  must  have 
played  him  too  fierce,"  said  Andy  sympathetically. 
Blackmore  was  inclined  to  be  frivolous.  "P'raps  he 
was  trying  to  register  'Big  Bend,'  "  said  he. 

Just  after  we  had  pushed  off  there  came  a  heavy 
and  increasing  roar  from  across  the  lake.    Presently 


144  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

the  cascade  of  Trident  Creek  sj)rang  into  life  again, 
but  now  a  squirt  of  yellow  ochre  where  before  it  was  a 
flutter  of  white  satin.  Rapidly  augmenting,  it  spread 
from  wall  to  wall  of  the  rocky  gorge,  discharging  to 
the  bosky  depths  of  the  delta  with  a  prodigious  rum- 
bling that  reverberated  up  and  down  tlie  lake  like 
heavy  thunder.  A  moment  later  the  flood  had  reached 
the  shore,  and  out  across  the  lucent  green  waters  of 
the  lake  spread  a  broadening  fan  of  yellow-brown. 
"I  told  you  hell  would  be  popping  after  that  big 
slide,"  said  Blackmore,  resting  on  his  paddle.  "That's 
the  backed-up  stream  breaking  through." 

Kinbasket  Lake  is  a  broadening  and  slackening  of 
the  Columbia,  backed  up  behind  the  obstructions 
which  cause  the  long  series  of  rapids  between  its  out- 
let and  the  mouth  of  Canoe  River.  It  is  six  or  seven 
miles  long,  according  to  the  stage  of  water,  and  from 
one  to  two  miles  wide.  Its  downward  set  of  current 
is  slight  but  perceptible.  The  outlet,  as  we  ap- 
proached it  after  a  three-mile  pull  from  our  camp  at 
Middle  River,  appeared  strikingly  similar  to  the 
head  of  Surprise  Rapids.  Here,  however,  the  tran- 
sition from  quiet  to  swift  water  was  even  more  abrupt. 

The  surface  of  the  lake  was  a-dance  with  the  rip- 
ples kicked  up  by  the  crisp  morning  breeze,  and  blind- 
ingly  bright  where  the  facets  of  the  tiny  wavelets 
reflected  the  sunlight  like  shaken  diamonds.  The 
shadowed  depth.'i  of  the  narrow  gorge  ahead  was 
Stygian  by  contrast.  Blackmore  called  my  attention 
to  the  way  the  crests  of  the  ^^ines  rimming  the  river  a 
few  hundred  yards  inside  the  gorge  appeared  just 
about  on  the  level  with  the  surface  of  the  lake.  "When 


KINBASKET  LAKE  AND  RAPIDS     145 

you  see  the  tree-tops  fall  away  like  that,"  he  said, 
standing  up  to  take  his  final  bearings  for  the  opening 
run,  "look  out.  It  means  there's  water  running  down 
hill  right  ahead  faster'n  any  boat  wants  to  put  its  nose 
in."  The  roar  rolling  up  to  us  was  not  quite  so  deep- 
toned  or  thunderous  as  the  challenging  bellow  of  the 
first  fall  of  Surprise;  but  it  was  more  "permeative," 
as  though  the  sources  from  which  it  came  ran  on  with- 
out end.  And  that  was  just  about  the  situation.  We 
were  sliding  down  to  the  intake  of  Kinbasket  or  "The 
Twenty-One-Mile"  Rapids,  one  of  the  longest,  if  not 
the  longest,  succession  of  practically  unbroken  riffles 
on  any  of  the  great  rivers  of  the  world. 

From  the  outlet  of  Kinbasket  Lake  to  the  mouth  of 
Canoe  River  is  twenty-one  miles.  For  the  sixteen 
miles  the  tail  of  one  rapid  generally  runs  right  into 
the  head  of  the  next,  and  there  is  a  fall  of  two  hundred 
and  sixty  feet,  or  more  than  sixteen  feet  to  the  mile. 
For  the  last  five  miles  there  is  less  white  water,  but 
the  current  runs  from  eight  to  twelve  miles  an  hour, 
with  many  swirls  and  whirlpools.  The  river  is  closely 
canyoned  all  the  way.  This  compels  one  to  make  the 
whole  run  through  in  a  single  day,  as  there  is  no  camp- 
ing place  at  any  point.  Cliffs  and  sharply-sloping 
boulder  banks  greatly  complicate  lining  down  and 
compel  frequent  crossings  at  points  where  a  failure  to 
land  just  right  is  pretty  likely  to  leave  things  in  a 
good  deal  of  a  mess. 

Blackmore  ran  us  down  through  a  couple  of  hun- 
dred yards  of  slap-banging  white  water,  before  com- 
ing to  bank  above  a  steep  pitch  where  the  river  tore 
itself  to  rags  and  tatters  across  a  patch  of  rocks  that 


146  DOWN  THE  COLUxMBIA 

seemed  to  block  the  whole  channel.  From  Captain 
Armstrong's  description,  this  was  the  exact  point 
where  the  trouble  with  his  tipsy  bow-paddler  had 
occurred,  the  little  difficulty  which  had  been  the  cause 
of  his  leaving  the  salvaged  cask  of  Scotch  at  his  next 
camp.  Like  pious  pilgrims  approaching  the  gate- 
way of  some  long-laboured-toward  shrine,  therefore, 
we  looked  at  the  place  with  much  interest,  not  to  say 
reverence.  Blackmore  was  perhaps  the  least  senti- 
mental of  us.  "I  wouldn't  try  to  run  that  next  fall 
for  all  the  whisky  ever  lost  in  the  old  Columbia,"  he 
said  decisively,  beginning  to  re-coil  his  long  line. 
Then  we  turned  to  on  lining  down  the  most  accursed 
stretch  of  river  boulders  I  ever  had  to  do  with. 

Barely  submerged  rocks  crowding  the  bank  com- 
pelled us  to  wade  in  and  lift  the  boat  ahead  even 
oftener  than  in  Surprise  Rapids.  Andy  always  took 
the  lead  in  this,  but  time  after  time  my  help  was  nec- 
essary to  throw  her  clear.  For  the  first  time  since  I 
had  boated  in  Alaska  a  good  many  years  previously, 
I  began  to  know  the  numbing  effects  of  icy  water. 
The  heavy  exertion  did  a  lot  to  keep  the  blood  mov- 
ing, but  three  or  four  minutes  standing  with  the  water 
up  to  mid- thigh  sent  the  chill  right  in  to  the  marrow 
of  the  bones,  even  when  sweat  was  running  off  the 
face  in  streams.  That  started  a  sort  of  dull  ache  in 
the  leg  bones  that  kept  creeping  higher  and  higher 
the  longer  one  remained  in  the  water.  That  ache  was 
the  worst  part  of  it;  the  flesh  became  dead  to  sensa- 
tion very  quickly,  but  that  penetrating  inward  pain 
had  more  hurt  in  it  every  minute  it  was  prolonged. 
It  was  bad  enough  in  the  legs,  but  when,  submerged 


KINBASKET  LAKE  AND  RAPIDS     147 

to  the  waist,  as  happened  every  now  and  then,  the  chill 
began  to  penetrate  to  the  back-bone  and  stab  the 
digestive  organs,  it  became  pretty  trying.  One  rea- 
Hzed  then  what  really  short  shrift  a  man  would  have 
trying  to  swim  for  more  than  four  or  five  minutes 
even  in  calm  water  of  this  temperature.  That  was 
about  the  limit  for  heart  action  to  continue  with  the 
cold  striking  in  and  numbing  the  veins  and  arteries,  a 
doctor  had  told  Blackmore,  and  this  seemed  reasona- 
ble. Andy  was  repeatedly  sick  at  the  stomach  after 
he  had  been  wet  for  long  above  the  waist.  My  own 
qualms  were  rather  less  severe  (doubtless  because  I 
was  exposed  rather  less),  but  I  found  myself  very 
weak  and  unsteady  after  every  immersion.  A  liberal 
use  of  rum  would  undoubtedly  have  been  of  some  help 
for  a  while,  but  Blackmore  was  adamant  against  start- 
ing in  on  it  as  long  as  there  was  any  bad  water  ahead. 
And  as  there  was  nothing  but  bad  water  ahead, 
this  meant  that — in  one  sense  at  least — we  were  a  "dry 
ship." 

I  shall  not  endeavour  to  trace  in  detail  our  painful 
progress  down  "Twenty-One-Mile."  Indeed,  I  could 
not  do  so  even  if  I  wanted,  for  the  very  good  reason 
that  my  hands  were  so  full  helping  with  the  boat  all 
the  way  that  I  had  no  time  to  make  notes,  and  even 
my  mental  record — usually  fairly  dependable — is 
hopelessly  jumbled.  Even  Blackmore  became  con- 
siderably mixed  at  times.  At  the  first  four  or  five 
rifflles  below  the  lake  he  called  the  turn  correctly, 
landing,  lining,  crossing  and  running  just  where  he 
should  have  done  so.  Then  his  mind-map  became 
less  clear.    Twice  he  lined  riffles  which  it  presently 


148  DOWN  THE  COLUINIBIA 

became  plain  we  could  have  run,  and  then  he  all  but 
failed  to  land  above  one  where  a  well-masked  "souse- 
hole"  would  have  gulped  the  boat  in  one  mouthful. 

It  was  at  this  juncture  that  I  asked  him  why  he  had 
never  taken  the  trouble  of  making  a  rough  chart  of 
this  portion  of  the  river,  so  that  he  could  be  quite 
sure  what  was  ahead.  He  said  that  the  idea  was  a 
good  one,  and  that  it  had  often  occurred  to  him. 
There  were  several  reasons  why  he  had  never  carried 
it  out.  One  was,  that  he  was  always  so  mad  when  he 
was  going  down  "Twenty-One-Mile"  that  he  couldn't 
see  straight,  let  alone  write  and  draw  straight.  This 
meant  that  the  chart  would  be  of  no  use  to  him,  even 
if  some  one  else  made  it — unless,  of  course,  he  brought 
the  maker  along  to  interpret  it.  The  main  deterrent, 
however,  had  been  the  fact  that  he  had  always  sworn 
each  passage  should  be  his  last,  so  that  (according  to 
his  frame  of  mind  of  the  moment)  there  would  be  no 
use  for  the  chart  even  if  he  could  have  seen  straight 
enough  to  make  it,  and  to  read  it  after  it  had  been 
made. 

The  scenery — so  far  as  I  recall  it — was  grand  be- 
yond words  to  describe.  Cliff  fronted  cliff,  with  a 
jagged  ribbon  of  violet-purple  sky  between.  Every 
few  hundred  yards  creeks  broke  through  the  moun- 
tain walls  and  came  cascading  into  the  river  over  their 
spreading  boulder  "fans."  Framed  in  the  narrow 
notches  from  which  they  sprang  appeared  transient 
visions  of  sun-dazzled  peaks  and  glaciers  towering 
above  wedge-shaped  valleys  swimming  full  of  lilac 
mist.  I  saw  these  things,  floating  by  like  double 
strips  of  movie  film,  only  when  we  were  running  in 


KINBASKET  LAKE  AND  RAPIDS     149 

the  current ;  when  hning  I  was  aware  of  little  beyond 
the  red  line  of  the  gunwale  which  I  grasped,  the  im- 
minent loom  of  Andy's  grey-shirted  shoulder  next 
me,  and  the  foam-flecked  swirl  of  liquefied  glacier 
enfolding  my  legs  and  swiftly  converting  them  to 
stumpy  icicles. 

There  was  one  comfort,  though.  The  farther  down 
river  we  worked  away  from  the  lake,  the  shorter  be- 
came the  stretches  of  lining  and  the  longer  the  rapids 
that  were  runnable.  That  accelerated  our  progress 
materially,  but  even  so  Blackmore  did  not  reckon  that 
there  was  time  to  stop  for  pictures,  or  even  for  lunch. 
We  were  still  well  up  to  schedule,  but  he  was  anxious 
to  work  on  a  good  margin  in  the  event  of  the  always- 
to-be-expected  "unexpected."  It  was  along  toward 
three  in  the  afternoon  that,  after  completing  a  partic- 
ularly nasty  bit  of  lining  a  mile  or  two  above  the 
mouth  of  Yellow  Creek,  he  came  over  and  slapped 
me  on  the  back.  "That  finishes  it  for  the  day,  young 
man,"  he  cried  gaily.  "We  can  turn  loose  and  run  the 
rest  of  it  now,  and  we'll  do  it  hell  sizzhng  fast.  It  may 
also  rejoice  you  to  know  that  all  the  lining  left  for 
the  whole  trip  is  a  couple  of  hundred  yards  at  'Rock 
Slide'  and  Death  Rapids.    All  aboard  for  the  Ferry!" 

All  of  a  sudden  life  had  become  a  blessed  thing 
again.  For  the  first  time  I  became  aware  that  there 
were  birds  singing  in  the  trees,  flowers  blooming  in 
the  protected  shelves  above  high-water-mark,  and 
maiden-hair  ferns  festooning  the  dripping  grottoes  of 
the  cliffs.  Dumping  the  water  from  our  boots,  Andy 
and  I  resumed  our  oars  and  swung  the  boat  right  out 
into  the  middle  of  the  current.    The  first  rapid  we  hit 


150  DOWN  THE  COLU^NIBIA 

was  a  vicious  side-winder,  shaped  like  a  letter  "S," 
with  overhanging  cliffs  playing  battledore-and-shut- 
tlecock  with  the  river  at  the  bends.  Blackmore  said 
he  would  have  lined  it  if  the  water  had  been  two  feet 
lower;  as  it  was  noW  we  would  get  wetter  trying  to 
worry  a  boat  round  the  cliffs  than  in  slashing  through. 
We  got  quite  wet  enough  as  it  was.  The  rocks  were 
not  hard  to  avoid,  but  banging  almost  side-on  into  the 
great  back-curving  combers  thrown  off  by  the  cliffs 
was  just  a  bit  terrifying.  Slammed  back  and  forth 
at  express-train  speed,  with  nothing  but  those  roaring 
open-faced  waves  buffeting  against  the  cliffs,  was 
somewhat  suggestive  of  the  sensation  you  get  from  a 
quick  double-bank  in  a  big  biplane.  Only  it  was 
wetter — much  wetter.  It  took  Blackmore  ten  min- 
utes of  hard  bailing  to  get  rid  of  the  splashage. 

The  succeeding  rapids,  though  no  less  swift,  were 
straighter,  and  easier — and  dryer.  Boos,  perched  up 
in  the  bow,  announced  that  all  was  over  but  the  dig- 
ging, and  started  to  sing  "Old  Green  Biver."  Andy 
and  I  joined  in  lustily,  and  even  Blackmore  (though 
a  lip-reader  would  have  sworn  he  was  mumbling  over 
a  rosary)  claimed  to  be  singing.  Exultant  as  we  all 
were  over  the  prize  so  nearly  within  our  grasp,  we 
must  have  put  a  world  of  feeling  into  that  heart- 
stirring  chorus. 

"I  was  drifting  down  the  old  Green  River 
On  the  good  ship  Roch-and-Rye — 
I  drifted  too  far ; 
I  got  stuck  on  the  bar ; 
I  was  out  there  alone, 
Wisliing  tluit  I  were  home — 


KINBASKET  LAKE  AND  RAPIDS     151 

The  Captain  was  lost,  with  all  of  the  crew, 
So  that  there  was  no-thing  left  to  do ; 

And  I  had  to  drink  the  whole  Green  River  dry-igh 

To  get  back  ho-ohm  to  you-oo-ou !" 

Smoother  and  smoother  became  the  going,  and 
then — rather  unexpectedly,  it  seemed  to  me — the 
water  began  to  slacken  its  dizzy  speed.  Blackmore 
appeared  considerably  puzzled  over  it,  I  thought. 
Roos,  turning  sentimental,  had  started  singing  a  song 
that  he  had  learned  from  a  phonograph,  and  in  which, 
therefore,  appeared  numerous  hiati. 

*'Now  I  know  da-da-da-da-da — 
Now  I  know  the  reason  why — 

Da-da-da-da da-da-da-daah — 

Now  I  know,  yes,  now  I  know! 

Da-da-da,  my  heart.    ..." 

Blackmore  frowned  more  deeply  as  the  treble  wail 
floated  back  to  him,  and  then  broke  into  the  next 
"da-da"  with  a  sudden  growl.  "I  say,  young  feller," 
he  roared,  slapping  sharply  into  the  quieting  water 
with  his  paddle  blade;  "if  you  know  so  geesly  much, 
I'm  wondering  if  you'd  mind  loosening  up  on  one  or 
two  things  that  have  got  me  buffaloed.  First  place, 
do  I  look  like  a  man  that  had  took  a  shot  of  hop?" 
"Not  at  all,  sir,"  quavered  Roos,  who  seemed  rather 
fearful  of  an  impending  call-down.  "I  don't,  huh?" 
went  on  the  gi'owl.  "Then  please  tell  me  why  what 
I  knows  is  a  ten-mile-an-hour  current  looks  to  me  like 
slack  water,  and  why  I  think  I  hear  a  roar  coming 
round  the  next  bend."    "But  the  water  is  slack,"  pro- 


152  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

tested  Roos,  "and  I've  heard  that  roar  for  five  min- 
utes myself.  Just  another  rapid,  isn't  it  (  The  water 
always  ..." 

"Rot!"  roared  the  veteran.  "There  ain't  no  fall 
with  a  rip-raring  thunder  like  that  'tween  Yellow 
Creek  and  Death  Rapids.  Rot,  I  tell  you !  I  must  ha' 
been  doped  after  all." 

Nevertheless,  when  that  ground-shaking  rumble 
assailed  us  in  a  raw,  rough  wave  of  savage  sound  as 
we  pulled  round  the  bend,  Blackmore  was  not  suffi- 
ciently confident  of  his  "dope  theory"  to  care  to  get 
any  nearer  to  it  without  a  preliminary  reconnaissance. 
Landing  a  hundred  yards  above  where  a  white  "eye- 
lash" of  up-flipped  water  showed  above  a  line  of  big 
rocks,  we  clambered  down  along  the  right  bank  on 
foot.  Presently  all  that  had  occurred  was  written 
clear  for  one  who  knew  the  way  of  a  slide  with  a 
river,  and  the  way  of  a  river  with  a  slide,  to  read  as 
on  the  page  of  a  book. 

"A  new  rapid,  and  a  whale  at  that!"  gasped  Black- 
more  in  astonishment;  "the  first  one  that's  ever  formed 
on  the  Columbia  in  my  time!" 

The  amazing  thing  that  had  happened  was  this: 
Sometime  in  the  spring,  a  landslide  of  enormous  size, 
doubtless  started  by  an  avalanche  of  snow  far  up  in 
the  Selkirks,  had  ripped  the  whole  side  of  a  mountain 
out  and  come  down  all  the  way  across  the  river.  As 
the  pines  were  hurled  backward  for  a  couple  of  hun- 
dred feet  above  the  river  on  the  right  or  Rocky  Moun- 
tain bank,  it  seemed  reasonable  to  believe  that  the  dam 
formed  had  averaged  considerably  more  than  that  in 
height.    As  this  would  have  backed  up  the  river  for 


KINBASKET  LAKE  AND  RAPIDS     153 

at  least  ten  or  twelve  miles,  it  is  probable  that  the  lake 
formed  must  have  been  rising  for  a  number  of  days 
before  it  flowed  over  the  top  of  the  barrier  and  began 
to  sluice  it  away.  On  an  incalculably  larger  scale,  it 
was  just  the  sort  of  thing  we  had  heard  and  seen  hap- 
pening on  Trident  Creek,  opposite  our  Kinbasket 
Lake  camp.  Not  the  least  remarkable  thing  in  con- 
nection with  the  stupendous  convulsion  was  the  fact 
that  a  large  creek  was  flowing  directly  down  the  great 
gash  torn  out  by  the  slide  and  emptying  right  into  the 
rapid  which  was  left  when  the  dam  had  been  washed 
away.  Blackmore  was  quite  positive  that  there  had 
been  no  creek  at  this  point  the  last  time  he  was  there. 
It  seemed  reasonable  to  suppose,  therefore,  that  the 
slide,  in  removing  a  considerable  section  of  mountain 
wall,  had  opened  a  new  hne  of  drainage  for  some  little 
valley  in  the  high  Selkirks. 

It  was  the  great,  rough  fragments  of  cliff  and  native 
rock  left  after  the  earth  had  been  sluiced  out  of  the 
dam  that  remained  to  form  the  unexpected  rapid 
which  now  confronted  us.  They  had  not  yet  been 
worn  smooth  like  the  rest  of  the  river  boulders,  and 
it  was  this  fact,  doubtless,  that  gave  the  cascade  tum- 
bling through  and  over  them  such  a  raw,  raucous 
roar. 

The  solution  of  the  mystery  of  the  appearance  of 
the  rapid  was  only  an  incident  compared  with  the 
problem  of  how  to  pass  it.  There  was  a  compara- 
tively straight  channel,  but  there  was  no  possibility 
that  the  boat  could  live  in  the  huge  rollers  that  bil- 
lowed down  the  middle  of  it.  Just  to  the  right  of  the 
middle  there  was  a  smoother  chute  which  looked  bet- 


154  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

ter — provided  the  boat  could  be  kept  to  it.  Black- 
more  said  that  it  looked  like  too  much  of  a  risk,  and 
decided  to  try  to  line  down  the  right  bank — the  one 
on  which  we  had  landed.  As  the  river  walls  were  too 
steep  and  broken  to  allow  any  of  the  outfit  to  be  por- 
taged, the  boat  would  have  to  go  through  loaded. 

A  big  up-rooted  pine  tree,  extending  out  fifty  feet 
over  the  river  and  with  its  under  limbs  swept  by  the 
water,  seemed  likely  to  prove  our  worst  difficulty,  and 
I  am  inclined  to  believe  it  would  have  held  us  up  in 
the  end,  even  after  we  reached  it.  As  things  turned 
out,  however,  it  troubled  us  not  a  whit,  for  the  boat 
never  got  down  that  far.  Right  at  the  head  of  the 
rapid  her  bows  jammed  between  two  submerged 
boulders  about  ten  feet  from  the  bank,  and  there  she 
stuck.  As  it  was  quickly  evident  that  it  was  out  of  the 
question  to  lift  her  on  through,  it  now  became  a  prob- 
lem of  working  her  back  up-stream  out  of  the  jaws 
that  held  her.  But  with  the  full  force  of  the  current 
driving  her  tighter  between  the  rocks,  she  now  refused 
to  budge  even  in  the  direction  from  which  she  had 
come. 

As  I  look  back  on  it  now,  the  fifteen  minutes  Andy 
and  I,  mid-waist  deep  in  the  icy  water,  spent  trying  to 
work  that  hulking  red  boat  loose  so  that  Blackmore 
could  haul  her  back  into  quiet  water  for  a  fresh  start 
takes  pride  of  place  as  the  most  miserable  interval  of 
the  whole  trip.  After  Andy's  experience  in  Surprise 
Rapids,  neither  of  us  was  inclined  to  throw  his  whole 
weight  into  a  lift  that  might  leave  him  overbalanced 
when  the  boat  was  swept  out  of  his  reach.  And  so  we 
pulled  and  hauled  and  cursed  (I  should  hate  to  have 


KINBASKET  LAKE  AND  RAPIDS     155 

to  record  all  we  said  about  the  ancestry  of  the 
river,  the  boat,  and  the  two  rocks  that  held  the  boat), 
while  the  tentacles  of  the  cold  clutched  deeper  with 
every  passing  minute.  Roos,  sitting  on  a  pine  stump 
and  whittling,  furnished  no  help  but  some  slight  diver- 
sion. When  he  started  singing  "Old  Green  River" 
just  after  I  had  slipped  and  soused  my  head  in  the 
current,  I  stopped  tugging  at  the  boat  for  long 
enough  to  wade  out  and  shy  a  stone  at  him.  "Green 
River"  ^  was  all  right  in  its  place,  but  its  place  was 
swirling  against  the  inside  of  the  ribs,  not  the  outside. 
Roos  had  the  cheek  to  pick  the  rock  up  out  of  his  lap 
and  heave  it  back  at  me — but  with  an  aim  less  certain 
than  my  own.  A  few  minutes  later  he  called  out  to 
Blackmore  to  ask  if  this  new  rapid  had  a  name,  add- 
ing that  if  it  had  not,  he  would  like  to  do  his  em- 
ployer, Mr.  Chester,  the  honour  of  naming  it  after 
him.  Blackmore  relaxed  his  strain  on  the  line  for  a 
moment  to  roar  back  that  no  rapid  was  ever  named 
after  a  man  unless  he  had  been  "drownded"  in  it. 
"We'll  name  this  one  after  you  if  you'll  do  the  need- 
ful," he  growled  as  an  afterthought,  throwing  his 
weight  again  onto  his  line.  That  tickled  Andy  and 
me  so  mightily  that  we  gave  a  prodigious  heave  in 
all  recklessness  of  consequences,  and  off  she  came. 
Gaining  the  bank  with  little  trouble,  we  joined  Black- 
more  and  helped  him  haul  her  up  by  line  into  slower 
water. 

"No  good  lining,"  the  "Skipper"  announced  decid- 

^  For  the  benefit  of  those  who  have  forgotten,  or  may  never  have 
known,  I  will  state  that  "  Green  River "  was  the  name  of  a  brand 
of  whisky  consximed  by  ancient  American?  with  considerable  gusto. 
L.  R.  F. 


156  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

edly,  as  we  sat  down  to  rest  for  a  spell ;  "I'm  going  to 
drive  her  straight  through."  Chilled,  weary  and 
dead-beat  generally,  I  was  in  a  state  of  mind  that 
would  have  welcomed  jumping  into  the  rapid  with  a 
stone  tied  to  my  neck  rather  than  go  back  to  the  half- 
submerged  wading  and  lifting.  Roos  said  he  hated 
to  risk  his  camera,  and  so  would  try  to  crawl  with  it 
over  the  cliff  and  rejoin  us  below  the  rapid.  Andy 
said  he  was  quite  game  to  pull  his  oar  for  a  run  if  we 
had  to,  but  that  he  would  first  like  to  try  lining  down 
the  opposite  bank.  He  thought  we  could  make  it 
there,  and  he  had  just  a  bit  of  a  doubt  about  what 
might  happen  in  mid-river.  That  was  reasonable 
enough,  and  Blackmore  readily  consented  to  try  the 
other  side. 

Almost  at  once  it  appeared  that  we  had  landed  in 
the  same  trouble  as  on  the  right  bank.  Directly  off 
the  mouth  of  the  stream  that  came  down  from  the 
slide  the  bow  of  the  boat  was  caught  and  held  between 
two  submerged  rocks,  defying  our  every  attempt  to 
lift  it  over.  Blackmore  was  becoming  impatient 
again,  and  was  just  ready  to  give  up  and  run,  when 
Andy,  with  the  aid  of  a  young  tree-trunk  used  as  a 
lever,  rolled  one  of  the  boulders  aside  and  cleared  the 
way.  Five  minutes  later  we  had  completed  lining 
down  and  were  pushing  off  for  the  final  run  to  the 
Ferry.  No  more  "mystery  rapids"  cropped  up  to 
disturb  our  voyage,  and,  pulling  in  deep,  swift  water, 
we  made  the  next  five  miles  in  twenty-five  minutes. 
A  part  of  the  distance  was  through  the  rocky-walled 
Red  Canyon,  one  of  the  grandest  scenic  bits  of  the 
Bend.    At  one  point  Blackmore  showed  us  a  sheer- 


OUR  WETTEST  CAMP  AT  KINBASKET  LAKE    (above) 
THE  OLD  FERRY  TOWER  ABOVE  CANOE  RIVER    {bcloiv) 


WHERE  WE  TIED  UP  AT   KINBASKET  LAKE    { above) 

THE  BRIDGE  WHICH  THE   COLUMBIA  CARRIED  A   HUNDRED   MILES 
AND   PLACED   ACROSS   ANOTHER   STREAM    (center) 

LINING  DOWN  TO  THE  HEAD  OF  DEATH  RAPIDS    (  beloiv) 


KINBASKET  LAKE  AND  RAPIDS     157 

sided  rock  island,  on  which  he  said  he  had  once  found 
the  graves  of  two  white  men,  with  an  inscription  so 
worn  as  to  be  indecipherable.  He  thought  they  were 
probably  those  of  miners  lost  during  the  Cariboo 
gold-field  excitement  of  the  middle  of  the  last  century, 
or  perhaps  even  those  of  Hudson  Bay  voyageurs  of  a 
century  or  more  back.  There  were  many  unidenti- 
fied graves  all  the  way  round  the  Bend,  he  said. 

The  river  walls  fell  back  a  bit  on  both  sides  as  we 
neared  our  destination,  and  the  low-hanging  western 
sun  had  found  a  gap  in  the  Selkirks  through  whi'^h  it 
was  pouring  its  level  rays  to  flood  with  a  rich  amber 
light  the  low  wooded  benches  at  the  abandoned  cross- 
ing. The  old  Ferry-tower  reared  itself  upward  like 
the  Statue  of  Liberty,  bathing  its  head  in  the  golden 
light  of  the  expiring  day.  Steering  for  it  as  to  a  bea- 
con, Blackmore  beached  the  boat  on  a  gravel  bar 
flanking  an  eddy  almost  directly  under  the  rusting 
cable.  We  would  cross  later  to  spend  the  night  in  a 
trapper's  cabin  on  the  opposite  bank,  he  said ;  as  there 
was  sure  to  be  a  shovel  or  two  in  the  old  ferry  shacks, 
he  had  come  there  at  once  so  as  to  get  down  to  busi- 
ness without  delay. 

Right  then  and  there,  before  we  left  the  boat,  I  did 
a  thing  which  I  have  been  greatly  gratified  that  I  did 
do — right  then  and  there.  I  drew  my  companions 
close  to  me  and  assured  them  that  I  had  made  up  my 
mind  to  divide  the  spoils  with  them.  Blackmore  and 
Andy  should  have  a  gallon  apiece,  and  Roos  a  quart. 
(I  scaled  down  the  latter's  share  sharply,  partly  be- 
cause he  had  thrown  that  stone  back  at  me,  and  the 
nerve  of  it  rankled,  and  partly — I  must  confess — out 


158  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

of  "professional  jealousy."  "Stars"  and  "Directors" 
never  do  hit  off.)  The  rest  I  would  retain  and  divide 
with  Captain  Armstrong  as  agreed.  I  did  not  tell 
them  that  I  had  high  hopes  that  Armstrong  would 
soften  in  the  end  and  let  me  keep  it  all  to  take  home. 
After  all  of  them  (including  Roos)  had  wrung  my 
hand  with  gratitude,  we  set  to  work,  each  in  his  own 
way. 

The  spot  was  readily  located  the  moment  we  took 
the  compass  bearing.  Pacing  off  was  quite  unneces- 
sary. It  was  in  the  angle  of  a  V-shaped  outcrop  of 
bedrock,  where  a  man  who  knew  about  what  was 
there  could  feel  his  way  and  claw  up  the  treasure  in 
the  dark.  It  was  an  "inevitable"  hiding  place,  just  as 
Gibraltar  is  an  inevitable  fortress  and  Manhattan  an 
inevitable  metropolis.  Yes,  we  each  went  to  work  in 
our  own  way.  Blackmore  and  Andy  found  a  couple 
of  rusty  shovels  and  went  to  digging;  Roos  climbed 
up  into  the  old  ferry  basket  to  take  a  picture  of  them 
digging;  I  climbed  up  on  the  old  shack  to  take  a  pic- 
ture of  Roos  taking  a  picture  of  them  digging.  Noth- 
ing was  omitted  calculated  to  preserve  historical 
accuracy.  I  had  been  in  Baalbek  just  before  the  war 
when  a  German  archaeological  mission  had  inaugu- 
rated excavation  for  Phoenician  antiquities,  and  so 
was  sapient  in  all  that  an  occasion  of  the  kind  required. 

The  picture  cycle  complete,  I  strolled  over  to  where 
Andy  and  Blackmore  were  making  the  dirt  fly  like  a 
pair  of  Airedales  digging  out  a  badger.  The  ground 
was  soft,  they  said,  leaning  on  their  shovels ;  it  ought 
to  be  only  the  matter  of  minutes  now.  The  "show- 
ings" were  good.     They  had  already  unearthed  a, 


KINBASKET  LAKE  AND  RAPIDS     159 

glove,  a  tin  cup  and  a  fragment  of  barrel  iron.  "Gor- 
geous stroke  of  luck  for  us  that  chap,  K ,  hit  the 

stuff  so  hard  up  at  Kinbasket,"  I  murmured  ecstati- 
cally. Blackmore  started  and  straightened  up  like  a 
man  hit  with  a  steel  bullet.     "What  was  that  name 

again?"  he  gasped.    "K ,"  I  replied  wonderingly; 

"some  kind  of  a  Swede,  I  believe  Armstrong  said. 
But  what  difference  does  his  name  make  as  long 
as  .    .    . 

Blackmore  tossed  his  shovel'  out  of  the  hole  and 
climbed  stiffly  up  after  it  before  he  replied.  When  he 
spoke  it  was  in  a  voice  thin  and  trailing,  as  though 
draggled  by  the  Weariness  of  the  Ages.  "Difference, 
boy!    All  the  difference  between  hell  and  happiness. 

About  two  years  ago  K dropped  out  of  sight 

from  Revelstoke,  and  it  was  only  known  he  had  gone 
somewhere  on  the  Bend.  A  week  after  he  returned  he 
died  in  the  hospital  of  the  'D.  T's.'  " 

Boos  (perhaps  because  he  had  the  least  to  lose  by 
the  disaster)  was  the  only  one  who  had  the  strength 
to  speak.  It  seemed  that  he  had  studied  Latin  in  the 
high  school.  ''Sic  transit  gloria  spiritum  frumentir 
was  what  he  said.  Never  in  all  the  voyage  did  he 
speak  so  much  to  the  point. 

Blackmore  frowned  at  him  gloomily  as  the  mystic 
words  were  solemnly  pronounced.  "Young  feller," 
he  growled,  "I  don't  savvy  what  the  last  part  of  that 
drug-store  lingo  you're  spitting  means;  but  you're 
dead  right  about  the  first  part.  Sick  is  sure  the  word." 

We  spent  the  night  in  an  empty  trapper's  cabin 
across  the  river.  Charity  forbids  that  I  lift  the  cur- 
tain of  the  house  of  mourning. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

ni.     RUNNING    THE   BEND 

Boat  Encampment  to  Rcvelstoke 

We  were  now  close  to  the  historic  Boat  Encamp- 
ment, where  at  last  our  course  would  join  with  that 
followed  by  the  early  voyageurs  and  explorers.  No 
point  in  the  whole  length  of  the  Columbia,  not  even 
Astoria,  has  associations  more  calculated  to  stir  the 
imagination  than  this  tiny  patch  of  silt-covered  over- 
flow flat  which  has  been  formed  by  the  erosive  action 
of  three  torrential  rivers  tearing  at  the  hearts  of  three 
great  mountain  ranges.  Sand  and  soil  of  the  Rockies, 
Selkirks  and  the  Gold  Range,  carried  by  the  Colum- 
bia, Canoe  and  Wood  rivers,  meet  and  mingle  to  form 
the  remarkable  halting  place,  where  the  east  and  west- 
bound pioneering  traffic  of  a  century  stopped  to 
gather  breath  for  the  next  stage  of  its  journey. 

Before  pushing  off  from  the  Ferry  on  the  morning 
of  October  seventh  I  dug  out  from  my  luggage  a  copy 
of  a  report  written  in  1881  by  Lieutenant  Thomas  W. 
Symons,  U.  S.  A.,  on  the  navigation  of  the  Upper 
Columbia.  This  was  chiefly  concerned  with  that  part 
of  the  river  between  the  International  Boundary  and 
the  mouth  of  the  Snake,  but  Lieutenant  Symons  had 
made  a  long  and  exhaustive  study  of  the  whole  Colum- 
bia Basin,  and  his  geographical  description  of  the 
three  rivers  which  unite  at  Boat  Encampment  is  so 

160 


ENCAMPMENT  TO  REVELSTOKE    161 

succinct  and  yet  so  comprehensive  that  I  am  impelled 
to  make  a  liberal  quotation  from  it  here.  Of  the  great 
assistance  I  had  from  Lieutenant  Symons'  invaluable 
report  when  I  came  to  the  passage  of  that  part  of  the 
river  covered  by  his  remarkable  voyage  of  forty  years 
ago  I  shall  write  later. 

"Amid  the  universal  gloom  and  midnight  silence  of  the 
north,  a  little  above  the  fifty-second  parallel  of  latitude, 
seemingly  surrounded  on  all  sides  by  cloud-piercing  snow- 
clad  mountains,  and  nestled  down  among  the  lower  and 
nearer  cedar-mantled  hills,  there  lies  a  narrow  valley  where 
three  streams  meet  and  blend  their  waters,  one  coming  from 
the  southeast,  one  from  the  northwest,  and  one  from  the 
east.  The  principal  one  of  these  streams  is  the  one  from  the 
southeast  .  .  .  and  is  the  headwater  stream,  and  bears  the 
name  of  the  Columbia. 

"The  northwestern  stream  is  the  extreme  northern  branch 
of  the  Columbia,  rising  beyond  the  fifty-third  parallel  of 
latitude,  and  is  known  among  the  traders  and  voyageurs  as 
Canoe  River,  from  the  excellence  of  the  barks  obtained  on 
its  banks  for  canoe  building.  This  is  a  small  river,  forty 
yards  wide  at  its  mouth,  flowing  through  a  densely  timbered 
valley  in  which  the  trees  overhang  the  stream  to  such  an 
extent  as  almost  to  shut  it  out  from  the  light  of  heaven.  .   ,   . 

"Portage  River,  the  third  of  the  trio  of  streams,  the 
smallest  and  the  most  remarkable  of  them,  is  the  one  which 
enters  from  the  east.  It  has  its  source  in  the  very  heart  of 
the  Rocky  Mountains  and  flows  through  a  tremendous  cleft 
in  the  main  range  between  two  of  its  loftiest  peaks.  Mounts 
Brown  and  Hooker.  Just  underneath  these  giant  mountains, 
on  the  divide  known  as  'The  Height  of  Land,'  lie  two  small 
lakes,  each  about  thirty  yards  in  diameter,  and  which  are 
only  a  few  yards  from  each  other.    One  has  its  outlet  to  the 


162  DOWN  THE  COLU]MBIA 

west,  Portage  Kiver,  flowing  to  the  Columbia ;  the  other  has 
its  outlet  to  the  east,  Whirlpool  River,  a  branch  of  the 
Athabaska,  which  joins  the  Mackenzie  and  flows  to  the 
Arctic  Ocean. 

"The  elevated  valley  in  which  those  lakes  are  situated  is 
called  'The  Committee's  Punchbowl,'  and  the  nabobs  of  the 
fur  trade  always  treated  their  companions  to  a  bucket  of 
punch  when  this  point  was  reached,  if  they  had  the  ingredients 
from  which  to  make  it,  and  they  usually  had. 

"The  pass  across  the  mountains  by  the  Portage  River, 
'The  Committee's  Punchbowl'  and  Whirlpool  River,  known 
as  the  Athabaska  Pass,  was  for  many  years  the  route  of  the 
British  fur  traders  in  going  from  one  side  of  the  Rocky 
Mountains  to  the  other.  This  route  is  far  from  being  an 
easy  one,  and  a  description  of  the  difficulties,  dangers  and 
discomforts  of  a  trip  over  it  will  certainly  deter  any  one  from 
making  the  journey  for  pleasure.  A  great  part  of  the  way 
the  traveller  has  to  wade  up  to  his  middle  in  the  icy  waters 
of  Portage  River.  The  journey  had  to  be  made  in  the  spring 
before  the  summer  thaws  and  rains  set  in,  or  in  the  autumn 
after  severe  cold  weather  had  locked  up  the  mountain  drain- 
age. During  the  summer  the  stream  becomes  an  impetuous 
impassable  mountain  torrent." 

Considering  that  Lieutenant  Symons  had  never 
traversed  the  Big  Bend  nor  the  Athabaska  Pass,  this 
description  (which  must  have  been  written  from  his 
careful  readings  of  the  diaries  of  the  old  voyageurs) 
is  a  remarkable  one.  It  is  not  only  accurate  topo- 
graphically and  geographically,  but  it  has  an  "atmos- 
phere" which  one  who  does  know  tliis  region  at  first 
hand  will  be  quick  to  appreciate.  How  and  when  the 
stream  which  he  and  the  men  before  him  called  Por- 


ENCAMPMENT  TO  REVELSTOKE    163 

tage  River  came  to  have  its  name  changed  to  Wood, 
I  have  not  been  able  to  learn. 

A  mile  below  the  Ferry  Blackmore  called  my  atten- 
tion to  a  sharp  wedge  of  brown-black  mountain  which 
appeared  to  form  the  left  wall  of  the  river  a  short  way 
ahead.  That  lofty  out-thrust  of  rock,  he  said,  was  the 
extreme  northern  end  of  the  Selkirk  Range.  The 
Columbia,  after  receiving  the  waters  of  AVood  and 
Canoe  rivers,  looped  right  round  this  cape  and  started 
flowing  south,  but  with  the  massif  of  the  Selkirks  still 
forming  its  left  bank.  But  the  Rockies,  which  had 
formed  its  right  bank  all  the  way  from  its  source, 
were  now  left  behind,  and  their  place  was  taken  by 
the  almost  equally  lofty  Gold  Range,  which  drained 
east  to  the  Columbia  and  west  to  the  Thompson. 

The  Columbia  doubles  back  from  north  to  south  at 
an  astonishingly  sharp  angle, — as  river  bends  go,  that 
is.  Picture  mentally  Madison  Square,  New  York. 
Now  suppose  the  Columbia  to  flow  north  on  Broad- 
way, bend  round  the  Flatiron  Building  (which  repre- 
sents the  Selkirks),  and  then  flow  south  down  Fifth 
avenue.  Then  East  Twenty-Third  Street  would 
represent  Wood  River,  and  North  Broadway,  Canoe 
River.  Now  forget  all  the  other  streets  and  imagine 
the  buildings  of  Madison  Square  as  ten  to  twelve 
thousand-feet-high  mountains.  And  there  you  have 
a  model  of  the  apex  of  the  Big  Bend  of  the  Columbia. 

A  milky  grey-green  flood — straight  glacier  water  if 
there  ever  was  such — staining  the  clear  stream  of  the 
Columbia  marked  the  mouth  of  Wood  River,  and  we 
pulled  in  for  a  brief  glimpse  in  passing  of  what  had 
once  been  Boat  Encampment.    I  had  broken  my  ther- 


164  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

mometer  at  Kinbasket  Lake,  so  I  could  not  take  the 
temperatures  here;  but  AVood  River  was  beyond  all 
doubt  the  coldest  stream  I  had  ever  dabbled  a  finger- 
tip in.  What  the  ascent  to  Athabaska  Pass  must 
have  been  may  be  judged  from  this  description  by 
Alexander  Ross — one  of  the  original  Astoria  party — 
written  over  a  hundred  years  ago. 

"Picture  in  the  mind  a  dark,  narrow  defile,  skirted  on  one 
side  by  a  chain  of  inaccessible  mountains  rising  to  a  great 
height,  covered  with  snow,  and  slippery  with  ice  from  tlieir 
tops  down  to  the  water's  edge ;  and  on  the  other  a  beach 
comparatively  low,  but  studded  in  an  irregular  manner  with 
standing  and  fallen  trees,  rocks  and  ice,  and  full  of  drift- 
wood, over  which  the  torrent  everywhere  rushes  with  such 
irresistible  impetuosity  that  very  few  would  dare  to  adven- 
ture themselves  in  the  stream.  Let  him  again  imagine  a 
rapid  river  descending  from  some  great  height,  filling  up  the 
whole  channel  between  the  rocky  precipices  on  the  south,  and 
the  no  less  dangerous  barrier  on  the  north ;  and,  lastly,  let 
him  suppose  that  we  were  obliged  to  make  our  way  on  foot 
against  such  a  torrent,  by  crossing  and  recrossing  it  in  all 
its  turns  and  windings,  from  morning  till  night,  up  to  the 
middle  in  water,  and  he  will  understand  the  difficulties  to  be 
overcome  in  crossing  the  Rocky  Mountains." 

I  have  been  able  to  learn  nothing  of  records  which 
would  indicate  that  any  of  the  early  explorers  or  voy- 
ageurs  traversed  that  portion  of  the  Columbia  down 
which  we  had  just  come.  David  Thompson,  who  is 
credited  with  being  the  first  man  to  travel  the  Colum- 
bia to  the  sea,  although  he  spent  one  winter  at  the  foot 
of  Lake  Windermere,  appears  to  have  made  his  down- 


ENCAMPMENT  TO  REVELSTOKE     165 

river  push-off  from  Boat  Encampment.  Mr.  Basil 
G.  Hamilton,  of  Invermere,  sends  me  an  authoritative 
note  on  this  point,  based  on  Thompson's  own  journal. 
From  this  it  appears  that  the  great  astronomer-ex- 
plorer crossed  the  Rockies  by  Athabaska  Pass  and 
came  down  to  what  has  since  been  known  by  the  name 
of  Boat  Encampment  in  March,  1811.  Having  built 
himself  a  hut,  he  made  preparation  for  a  trip  down  the 
Columbia,  by  which  he  hoped  to  reach  the  mouth  in 
advance  of  either  of  the  Astor  parties,  and  thus  be  able 
to  lay  claim  to  the  whole  region  traversed  in  the  name 
of  the  Northwest  Company.  He  writes:  "We  first 
tried  to  get  birch  rind  wherewith  to  make  our  trip  to 
the  Pacific  Ocean,  but  without  finding  any  even  thick 
enough  to  make  a  dish.  So  we  split  out  thin  boards 
of  cedar  wood,  about  six  inches  in  breadth,  and  built 
a  canoe  twenty-five  feet  in  length  and  fifty  inches  in 
breadth,  of  the  same  form  as  a  common  canoe.  As 
we  had  no  nails  we  sewed  the  boards  to  each  other 
round  the  timbers,  making  use  of  the  fine  roots  of  the 
pine  which  we  split." 

This  ingeniously  constructed  but  precarious  craft 
was  finished  on  the  sixteenth  of  April,  and  Thomp- 
son's party  embarked  in  it  on  the  seventeenth.  Mr. 
Hamilton  doubts  if  this  was  the  same  craft  in  which 
they  finally  reached  Astoria.  From  my  own  knowl- 
edge of  what  lies  between  I  am  very  much  inclined  to 
agree  with  him.  Certainly  no  boat  of  the  construc- 
tion described  could  have  lasted  even  to  the  Arrow 
Lakes  without  much  patching,  and  if  a  boat  seeming 
on  the  lines  of  the  oi:iginal  really  reached  the  Pacific, 
it  must  have  been  many  times  renewed  in  the  course  of 


166  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

the  voyage.  I  shall  hardly  need  to  add  that  Thomp- 
son's remarkahle  journey,  so  far  as  its  original  object 
was  concerned,  was  a  failure.  He  reached  the  mouth 
of  the  Columbia  well  in  advance  of  Astor's  land  party, 
but  only  to  find  the  New  Yorker  fur-trader's  expedi- 
tion by  way  of  Cape  Horn  and  Hawaii  already  in 
occupation. 

Boat  Encampment  of  to-day  is  neither  picturesque 
nor  interesting;  indeed,  there  are  several  camp-sites 
at  the  Bend  that  one  would  choose  in  preference  to 
that  rather  damp  patch  of  brush-covered,  treeless 
clearing.  All  that  I  found  in  the  way  of  relics  of  the 
past  were  some  huge  cedar  stumps,  almost  covered 
with  silt,  and  the  remains  of  a  demolished  hatteau.  I 
salved  a  crude  oar-lock  from  the  latter  to  carry  as  a 
mascot  for  my  down-river  trip.  As  a  mascot  it  served 
me  very  well,  everything  considered;  though  it  did 
get  me  in  rather  bad  once  when  I  tried  to  use  it  for  an 
oar-lock. 

Before  the  sparkling  jade-green  stream  of  the 
Columbia  had  entirely  quenched  the  milky  flow  of 
Wood  River,  the  chocolate-brown  torrent  of  Canoe 
River  came  pouring  in  to  mess  things  up  anew.  The 
swift  northern  affluent,  greatly  swelled  by  the  recent 
rains,  was  in  flood,  and  at  the  moment  appeared  to  be 
discharging  a  flow  almost  if  not  quite  equal  to  that 
of  the  main  river.  For  a  considerable  distance  the 
waters  of  the  right  side  of  the  augmented  river  re- 
tained their  rich  cinnamon  tint,  and  it  was  not  until 
a  brisk  stretch  of  rapid  a  mile  below  the  Bend  got  in 
its  cocktail-shaker  action  that  the  two  streams 
became  thoroughly  blended.    Then  the  former  crys- 


ENCAMPMENT  TO  REVELSTOKE     167 

talline  clearness  of  the  Columbia  was  a  thing  of  the 
past.  It  was  still  far  from  being  a  muddy  river. 
There  was  still  more  of  green  than  of  brown  in  its 
waters,  but  they  were  dully  translucent  where  they 
had  been  brilliantly  transparent.  Not  until  the  hun- 
dred-mile-long settling-basin  of  the  Arrow  Lakes 
allowed  the  sediment  to  deposit  did  the  old  emerald- 
bright  sparkle  come  back  again. 

A  couple  of  quick  rifle  shots  from  the  left  bank  set 
the  echoes  ringing  just  after  we  had  passed  Canoe 
River,  and  Blackmore  turned  in  to  where  a  man  and 
dog  were  standing  in  front  of  an  extremely  pictur- 
esquely located  log  cabin.  It  proved  to  be  a  French- 
Canadian  half-breed  trapper  called  Alphonse  Ed- 
munds. His  interest  in  us  was  purely  social,  and 
after  a  five  minutes'  yarn  we  pulled  on.  Blackmore 
said  the  chap  hved  in  Golden,  and  that  to  avoid  the 
dreaded  run  down  through  Surprise  and  Kinbasket 
rapids,  he  was  in  the  habit  of  going  a  couple  of  hun- 
dred miles  by  the  C.  P.  R.  to  Kamloops,  thence  north 
for  a  hundred  miles  or  more  by  the  Canadian  North- 
ern, thence  by  pack-train  a  considerable  distance  over 
the  divide  to  the  head  of  Canoe  River,  and  finally 
down  the  latter  by  boat  to  the  Bend,  where  he  did  his 
winter  trapping.  This  was  about  four  times  the  dis- 
tance as  by  the  direct  route  down  the  Columbia,  and 
probably  at  least  quadrupled  time  and  expense.  It 
threw  an  illuminative  side-light  on  the  way  some  of  the 
natives  regarded  the  upper  half  of  the  Big  Bend. 

The  river  was  deeper  now,  but  still  plugged  along 
at  near  to  the  ten-miles-an-hour  it  had  averaged  from 
the  foot  of  Kinbasket  Rapids.    As  the  western  slopes 


168  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

of  the  Selkirks  were  considerably  more  extensive  than 
tlie  eastern,  the  drainage  to  the  Columbia  from  that 
side  was  proportionately  greater.  Cascades  and  cat- 
aracts came  tmnbling  in  every  few  hundred  yards,  and 
every  mile  or  two,  from  one  side  or  the  other,  a  consid- 
erable creek  would  pour  down  over  its  spreading 
boulder  "fan."  We  landed  at  twelve-thirty  and 
cooked  our  lunch  on  the  stove  of  a  perfect  beauty  of  a 
trapper's  cabin  near  the  mouth  of  Mica  Creek.  The 
trapper  had  already  begun  getting  in  his  winter  grub, 
but  was  away  at  the  moment.  The  whole  place  was  as 
clean  as  a  Dutch  kitchen.  A  recent  shift  of  channel 
by  the  fickle-minded  JMica  Creek  had  undermined 
almost  to  the  door  of  this  snug  little  home,  and  Andy 
reckoned  it  would  go  down  river  on  the  next  spring 
rise. 

We  ran  the  next  eighteen  miles  in  less  than  two 
hours,  tying  up  for  the  night  at  a  well-built  Govern- 
ment cabin  three  miles  below  Big  Mouth  Creek.  It 
was  occupied  for  the  winter  by  a  Swede  trapper 
named  Johnston.  He  was  out  running  his  trap-lines 
when  we  arrived,  but  came  back  in  time  to  be  our 
guest  for  dinner.  He  made  one  rather  important  con- 
tribution to  the  menu — a  "mulligan,"  the  piece  de 
resistance  of  which,  so  he  claimed,  was  a  mud-hen  he 
had  winged  with  his  revolver  that  morning.  There 
were  six  or  seven  ingredients  in  that  confounded  Irish 
stew  already,  and — much  to  the  disgust  of  Roos  and 
myself,  who  didn't  fancy  eating  mud-hen — Andy 
dumped  into  it  just  about  everything  he  had  been 
cooking  except  the  prunes.  That's  the  proper  caper 
with  "mulligans,"  and  they  are  very  good,  too,  unless 


LANDING  AT  SUNSET  ABOVE  CANOE  RIVER   (ubove) 
ANDY  AND  BLACKMORE  SWINGING  THE  BOAT  INTO  THE  HEAD  OF 

ROCK  SLIDE  RAPIDS  {Centre) 

THE  BIG  ROLLERS,  FROM   15  TO  20  FEET  FROM   HOLLOW  TO  CREST, 
AT  HEAD  OF  DEATH  RAPIDS    {beluw) 


ENCAMPMENT  TO  REVELSTOKE     169 

some  one  of  the  makings  chances  to  be  out  of  your 
line.  And  such  most  decidedly  was  mud-hen — fish- 
eating  mud-hen !  As  we  were  sort  of  company,  Roos 
and  I  put  on  the  best  faces  we  could  and  filled  up  on 
prunes  and  marmalade.  It  was  only  after  the  other 
three  had  cleaned  out  the  "mulligan"  can  that  Andy 
chanced  to  mention  that  "mud-hen"  was  the  popularly 
accepted  euphemism  for  grouse  shot  out  of  season! 

Andy  and  Blackmore  and  Johnston  talked  "trap- 
per stuff"  all  evening — tricks  for  tempting  marten, 
how  to  prevent  the  pesky  wolverine  from  robbing 
traps,  "stink-baits,"  prices,  and  the  prospects  for 
beaver  when  it  again  became  lawful  to  take  them. 
Johnston  was  a  typical  Swede,  with  little  apparent 
regard  for  his  physical  strength  if  money  could  be 
made  by  drawing  upon  it.  The  previous  season  he 
had  had  to  sleep  out  in  his  blankets  many  nights  while 
covering  his  lines,  and  he  counted  himself  lucky  that 
this  year  he  had  two  or  three  rough  cabins  for  shelter. 
He  was  a  terrific  worker  and  ate  sparingly  of  the 
grub  that  cost  him  twenty  cents  a  pound  to  bring  in. 
He  was  already  looking  a  bit  drawn,  and  Blackmore 
said  the  next  morning  that  he  would  be  more  or  less 
of  a  physical  wreck  by  spring,  just  as  he  had  been  the 
previous  season.  The  hardships  these  trappers  en- 
dure is  something  quite  beyond  the  comprehension 
of  any  one  who  has  not  been  with  them.  A  city  man, 
a  farmer,  even  a  sailor,  knows  nothing  to  compare 
with  it. 

We  were  a  mile  down  stream  the  next  morning 
before  Blackmore  discovered  that  his  rifle  had  been 
left  in  Johnston's  cabin,  and  it  took  him  an  hour  of 


170  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

hard  breaking  through  the  wet  underbrush  to  recover 
it.  The  river  was  still  rising  from  the  rains,  and  the 
current  swift  with  occasional  rapids.  Blackmore 
approached  the  head  of  Gordon  Rapids  (named,  of 
course,  from  a  man  of  that  name  who  had  lost  his  life 
there)  with  considerable  caution.  He  intended  to 
run  them,  he  said,  but  the  convergence  of  currents 
threw  a  nastj^  cross-riffle  that  was  not  to  be  taken 
liberties  with.  He  appeared  considerably  relieved 
when  he  found  that  the  high  water  made  it 
possible  to  avoid  the  main  rapid  by  a  swift  but  com- 
paratively clear  back-channel.  We  had  a  good  view 
of  the  riffle  from  below  when  we  swung  back  into  the 
main  channel.  It  was  certainly  a  vicious  tumble  of 
wild  white  water,  and  even  with  our  considerable  free- 
board it  would  have  been  a  sloppy  run.  I  should 
have  been  very  reluctant  to  go  into  it  all  with  a  smaller 
boat. 

Still  deeply  canyoned  between  lofty  mountains,  the 
scenery  in  this  part  of  the  Bend  was  quite  equal  to 
the  finest  through  which  we  had  passed  above  Canoe 
River.  The  steady  drizzle  which  had  now  set  in, 
however,  made  pictures  out  of  the  question.  This  did 
not  deter  Roos  from  looking  for  "location."  He  was 
under  special  instructions  to  make  some  effective 
camp  shots,  and  had  been  on  the  lookout  for  a  suita- 
ble place  ever  since  we  started.  This  day  he  found 
what  he  wanted.  Shooting  down  a  swift,  rough  rapid 
shortly  after  noon,  we  rounded  a  sharp  bend  and  shot 
past  the  mouth  of  a  deep  black  gorge  with  the  white 
shimmer  of  a  big  waterfall  just  discernible  in  its 
dusky  depths.    Almost  immediately  opposite  a  rocky 


ENCAMPMENT  TO  REVELSTOKE     171 

point  jutted  out  into  the  eddy.  It  was  thickly  car- 
peted with  moss  and  grass,  and  bright  with  the  reds 
and  yellows  of  patches  of  late  flowers.  At  its  base 
was  an  almost  perfect  circle  of  towering  cedars  and 
sugar  pines,  their  dark  green  foliage  standing  out  in 
fretwork  against  the  pale  purple  mists  filling  the 
depths  of  a  wedge-shaped  bit  of  mountain  valley  be- 
hind. There  were  glaciers  and  peaks  hanging  giddily 
above,  but  these  were  obscured  by  the  rain  clouds. 

In  response  to  Roos'  glad  "Eureka!"  Blackmore 
threw  the  boat's  head  sharply  toward  the  left  bank, 
and  hard  pulling  just  won  us  the  edge  of  the  eddy. 
Missing  that,  we  would  have  run  on  into  the  rough- 
and-tumble  of  Twelve-Mile  Rapids,  where  (as  we 
found  the  next  day )  there  was  no  landing  for  another 
half  mile.  The  place  looked  even  loveher  at  close 
range  than  from  the  river,  and  Roos  announced  deci- 
sively that  we  were  not  going  to  stir  from  there  until 
the  sun  came  to  give  him  light  for  his  camp  shots. 
Fortunately,  this  befell  the  next  morning.  After 
that,  to  the  best  of  my  recollection,  we  did  not  see  the 
sun  again  until  we  crossed  over  to  the  U.  S.  A.  many 
days  later. 

Roos  took  a  lot  of  trouble  with  his  camp  picture, 
and  I  have  since  heard  that  it  was  most  favourably 
reported  upon  from  the  studio.  Setting  up  on  the 
end  of  the  point,  he  made  his  opening  shot  as  the  boat 
ran  down  the  rapid  (we  had  had  to  line  back  above 
for  this,  of  course)  and  floundered  through  the  swirls 
and  whirlpools  past  the  mouth  of  the  gloomy  gorge 
and  its  half-guessed  waterfall.  After  landing  and 
packing  our  outfit  up  the  bank,  trees  were  felled, 


172  DOWN  THE  COLU]MBIA 

boughs  cut  and  spread  and  the  tent  set  up.  Finally, 
we  fried  bacon,  tossed  flapjacks  and  baked  bannocks. 
I  could  tell  by  his  expression  that  Roos  dearly  wanted 
to  lend  a  ^lack  Sennett  "custard-pie"  touch  by  hav- 
ing some  one  smear  some  one  else  in  the  face  with  a 
mushy  half-baked  bannock,  but  discretion  prevailed. 
Qualified  "smearers"  there  were  in  plenty — Andy  and 
Blackmore  were  wood-choppers  and  I  was  an  ex- 
pitcher  and  shot-putter, — but  the  designation  of  a 
"smear-ee"  was  quite  another  matter.  Roos  did  well 
to  stop  where  he  did. 

Pushing  off  about  noon,  we  dropped  down  to  near 
the  head  of  "Twelve-Mile,"  and  put  Roos  ashore  on 
the  right  bank  for  a  shot  as  we  ran  through.  We  had 
expected  to  land  to  pick  him  up  at  the  foot  of  the 
rapid,  but  Blackmore,  in  order  to  make  the  picture  as 
spectacular  as  possible,  threw  the  boat  right  into  the 
midst  of  the  white  stuff.  There  was  a  good  deal  of 
soft  fluff  flying  in  the  air,  but  nothing  with  much 
weight  in  it.  We  ran  through  easily,  but  got  so  far 
over  toward  the  left  bank  that  it  was  impossible  to 
pull  into  the  eddy  we  had  hoped  to  make.  Andy  and 
I  pulled  our  heads  off  for  five  minutes  before  we 
could  reach  slack  water  near  the  left  bank,  and  by 
then  we  were  a  quarter  of  a  mile  below  the  foot  of  the 
rapid.  Andy  had  to  go  back  to  help  Roos  down  over 
the  boulders  with  his  machine  and  tripod.  Another 
mile  in  fast  water  brought  us  to  the  liead  of  Rock 
Slide  Rajjids,  and  we  landed  on  the  right  bank  for 
our  last  stretch  of  lining  on  the  Big  Bend. 

The  Rock  Slide  is  tlie  narrowest  point  on  the  whole 
Columbia  between  Lake  Windermere  and  the  Pacific. 


ENCAMPMENT  TO  REVELSTOKE     173 

An  almost  perpendicular  mountainside  has  been  en- 
croaching on  the  river  here  for  many  years,  possibly 
damming  it  all  the  way  across  at  times.  From  the 
Slide  to  the  precipitous  left  bank  there  is  an  average 
channel  seventy  feet  in  width,  through  which  the 
river  rushes  with  tremendous  velocity  over  and  be- 
tween enormous  sharp-edged  boulders.  This  pours 
into  a  cauldron-like  eddy  at  a  right-angled  bend,  and 
over  the  lower  end  of  that  swirling  maelstrom  the 
river  spills  into  another  narrow  chute  to  form  the 
Dalles  des  Morts  of  accursed  memory.  I  know  of  no 
place  on  the  upper  half  of  the  Bend  where  the  river 
is  less  than  a  hundred  feet  wide.  The  Little  Dalles, 
just  below  the  American  line,  are  about  a  hundred 
and  forty  feet  across  in  their  narrowest  part,  and  the 
Great  Dalles  below  Celilo  Falls  are  slightly  wider. 
Kettle  Falls,  Hell-Gate  and  Rock  Island  Rapids 
have  side  channels  of  less  than  a  hundred  feet,  but  the 
main  channels  are  much  broader.  Save  only  the 
Dalles  des  Morts  (which  are  really  its  continuation) 
the  Rock  Slide  has  no  near  rival  anywhere  on  the 
river. 

It  has  struck  me  as  quite  probable  that  the  Rock 
Slide,  and  the  consequent  constriction  of  the  river  at 
that  point,  are  of  comparatively  recent  occurrence, 
almost  certainly  of  the  last  hundred  years.  In  the 
diaries  of  Ross,  Cox  and  Franchiere,  on  which  most 
of  the  earlier  Columbian  history  is  based,  I  can  find 
no  mention  of  anything  of  the  kind  at  this  point,  a 
location  readily  identifiable  because  of  its  proximity 
to  the  Dalles  des  Morts,  which  they  all  mention.  But 
in  Ross'  record  I  do  find  this  significant  passage : 


174  DOWN  THE  C0LU:MBIA 

"A  little  after  starting  (from  the  Dalles  des  Morts)  we 
backed  our  paddles  and  stood  still  for  some  minutes  admiring 
a  striking  curiosity.  The  water  of  a  cataract  creek,  after 
shooting  over  the  brink  of  a  bold  precipice,  falls  in  a  white 
sheet  onto  a  broad,  flat  rock,  smooth  as  glass,  which  forms 
tlie  first  step;  then  upon  a  second,  some  ten  feet  lower  down, 
and  lastly,  on  a  third,  somewhat  lower.  It  then  enters  a 
subterranean  vault,  formed  at  the  mouth  like  a  funnel,  and 
after  passing  through  this  funnel  it  again  issues  forth  with 
a  noise  like  distant  thunder.  After  falling  over  another  step 
it  meets  the  front  of  a  bold  rock,  which  repulses  back  the 
water  with  such  violence  as  to  keep  it  whirling  around  in 
a  large  basin.  Opposite  to  this  rises  the  wing  of  a  shelving 
cliff,  which  overhangs  the  basin  and  forces  back  the  rising 
spray,  refracting  in  the  sunshine  all  the  colours  of  the  rain- 
bow.   The  creek  then  enters  the  Columbia." 

On  the  left  bank,  immediately  above  the  Dalles  des 
Morts,  an  extremely  beautiful  little  waterfall  leaps 
into  the  river  from  the  cliffs,  but  neither  this  (as  will 
readily  be  seen  from  my  photograph  of  it)  nor  any 
other  similar  fall  I  saw  in  the  whole  length  of  the 
Columbia,  bears  the  least  suggestion  of  a  resem- 
blance to  the  remarkable  cataract  Ross  so  strikingly 
describes.  But  I  did  see  a  very  sizable  stream  of 
water  cascading  right  down  the  middle  of  the  great 
rock  slide,  and  at  a  point  which  might  very  well  coin- 
cide with  that  at  which  Ross  saw  his  "stairway-and- 
tunnel"  phenomenon.  Does  it  not  seem  quite  possi- 
ble that  the  latter  sliould  have  undermined  the  cliff 
over  and  through  which  it  was  tmnbling,  precipitating 
it  into  the  river  and  forming  the  Rock  Slide  of  the 
present  day? 


ENCAMPMENT  TO  REVELSTOKE     175 

The  middle  of  the  channel  at  Rock  Slide  was  a 
rough,  smashing  cascade  that  looked  quite  capable 
of  grinding  a  boat  to  kindling  wood  in  a  hundred 
feet ;  but  to  the  right  of  it  the  water  was  considerably 
better.  Blackmore  said  the  chances  would  be  all  in 
favour  of  running  it  safely,  but,  if  anything  at  all 
went  wrong  (such  as  the  unshipping  of  an  oar,  for 
instance) ,  it  might  make  it  hard  to  get  into  the  eddy 
at  the  bend;  and  if  we  missed  the  eddy — Death  Rap- 
ids !  He  didn't  seem  to  think  any  further  elucidation 
was  necessary.  It  would  be  best  to  line  the  whole  way 
down,  he  said. 

On  account  of  the  considerable  depth  of  water 
right  up  to  the  banks,  the  boat  struck  on  the  rocks 
rather  less  than  usual;  but  the  clamber  over  the 
jagged,  fresh-fallen  granite  was  the  worst  thing  of 
the  kind  we  encountered.  I  did  get  a  bit  of  a  duck 
here,  though,  but  it  was  not  near  to  being  anything 
serious,  and  the  sequel  was  rather  amusing.  Losing 
my  footing  for  a  moment  on  the  only  occasion  I  had 
to  give  Andy  a  lift  with  the  boat,  I  floundered  for  a 
few  strokes,  kicked  into  an  eddy  and  climbed  out. 

Ever  since  Andy  had  his  souse  and  came  out  with 
empty  pockets,  I  had  taken  the  precaution  of  button- 
ing mine  securely  down  before  starting  in  to  line. 
The  buttons  had  resisted  the  best  efforts  of  the  klep- 
tomaniacal  river  current,  and  I  came  out  with  the 
contents  of  my  pocket  wet  but  intact.  But  there  was 
a  trifling  casualty  even  thus.  A  leg  of  my  riding 
breeches  was  missing  from  the  knee  down.  It  was  an 
ancient  pair  of  East  Indian  jodpurs  I  was  wearing 
(without  leggings,  of  course),  and  age  and  rough 


176  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

usage  had  opened  a  slit  at  the  knee.  Possibly  I 
caught  this  somewhere  on  the  boat  without  noting  it 
in  my  excitement;  or  it  is  even  possible  the  current 
did  tear  it  off.  There  was  nothing  especially  remark- 
able about  it  in  any  case.  All  the  same,  Blackmore 
and  Andy  always  solemnly  declared  that  the  geesly 
river,  baulked  by  my  buttons  of  its  designs  on  the 
contents  of  my  pockets,  had  tried  to  get  away  with 
my  whole  pair  of  pants !  If  that  was  so,  it  had  its  way 
in  the  end.  Before  I  set  out  on  the  second  leg  of  my 
voyage  from  the  foot  of  the  Arrow  Lakes,  I  threw 
the  river  god  all  that  was  left  of  that  bedraggled  pair 
of  jodpurs  as  a  propitiatory  offering. 

The  deeper  rumble  of  Death  Rapids  became  audi- 
ble above  the  higher-keyed  grind  of  Rock  Slide  as 
we  worked  down  toward  the  head  of  the  intervening 
eddy.  Of  all  the  cataracts  and  cascades  with  sinister 
records  on  the  Columbia  this  Dalles  of  the  Dead  has 
undoubtedly  been  the  one  to  draw  to  itself  the 
greatest  share  of  execration.  The  terrific  toll  of  lives 
they  have  claimed  is  unquestionably  traceable  to  the 
fact  that  this  swift,  narrow  chute  of  round-topped 
rollers  is  many  times  worse  than  it  looks,  especially  to 
a  comparatively  inexperienced  river  man,  and  there 
have  been  many  such  numbered  among  its  victims. 
There  are  two  or  three  places  in  Surprise  Rapids,  and 
one  or  two  even  in  Kinbasket,  that  the  veriest  green- 
horn would  know  better  than  to  try  to  run;  Death 
Rapids  it  is  conceivable  tliat  a  novice  might  try,  just 
as  many  of  them  have,  and  to  their  cost.  However,  it 
is  probable  that  the  greatest  number  that  have  died 
here  were  comparatively  experienced  men  who  were 


ENCAMPMENT  TO  REVELSTOKE     177 

sucked  into  the  death-chute  in  spite  of  themselves. 
Of  such  was  made  up  the  party  whose  tragic  fate 
gave  the  rapid  its  sinister  name.  Ross  Cox,  of  the 
original  Astorians,  tells  the  story,  and  the  account  of 
it  I  am  setting  down  here  is  slightly  abridged  from  his 
original  narrative. 

On  the  sixteenth  of  April,  1817,  Ross  Cox's  party  of 
twenty-three  left  Fort  George  (originally  and  subsequently 
Astoria)  to  ascend  the  Columbia  and  cross  the  Rockies  by 
the  Athabaska  Pass,  en  route  Montreal.  On  the  twenty- 
seventh  of  May  they  arrived  at  Boat  Encampment  after  the 
most  severe  labours  in  dragging  their  boats  up  the  rapids  and 
making  their  way  along  the  rocky  shores.  Seven  men  of  the 
party  were  so  weak,  sick  and  worn  out  that  they  were  unable 
to  proceed  across  the  mountains,  so  they  were  given  the 
best  of  the  canoes  and  provisions,  and  were  to  attempt  to 
return  down  river  to  Spokane  House,  a  Hudson  Bay  post 
near  the  mouth  of  uie  river  of  that  name.  They  reached 
the  place  which  has  since  borne  the  name  of  Dalles  des  Morts 
without  trouble.  There,  in  passing  their  canoe  down  over  the 
rapids  with  a  light  cod  line,  it  was  caught  in  a  whirlpool. 
The  line  snapped,  and  the  canoe,  with  all  the  provisions  and 
blankets,  w^as  lost. 

The  men  found  themselves  utterly  destitute,  and  at  a 
time  of  year  when  it  was  impossible  to  procure  any  wild 
fruit  or  roots.  The  continual  rising  of  the  water  completely 
inundated  the  beach,  which  compelled  them  to  force  their 
way  through  a  dense  forest,  rendered  almost  impervious  by  a 
thick  growth  of  prickly  underbrush.  Their  only  nourishment 
was  water.  On  the  third  day  a  man  named  Macon  died,  and 
his  surviving  comrades,  though  unconscious  of  how  soon  they 
might  be  called  on  to  follow  him,  divided  his  remains  into  equal 
parts,  on  which  they  subsisted  for  several  days.     From  the 


178  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

sore  and  swollen  state  of  their  feet,  their  daily  progress  did 
not  exceed  two  or  three  miles.  A  tailor  named  Holmes  was 
the  next  to  die,  and  the  others  subsisted  for  some  days  on  his 
emaciated  remains.  In  a  little  while,  of  the  seven  men,  only 
two  remained  alive — Dubois  and  La  Pierre.  La  Pierre  was 
subsequently  found  on  the  upper  Arrow  Lake  by  two  Indians 
who  were  coasting  it  in  a  canoe.  They  took  him  to  Kettle 
Falls,  from  where  he  was  carried  to  Spokane  House. 

He  stated  that  after  the  death  of  the  fifth  man  of  the 
party,  Dubois  and  he  remained  for  some  days  at  the  spot, 
living  on  the  remains.  When  they  felt  strong  enough  to 
continue,  they  loaded  themselves  with  as  much  of  the  flesh 
as  they  could  carry ;  that  with  this  they  succeeded  in  reach- 
ing the  Upper  Lake,  around  the  shores  of  which  they  wan- 
dered for  some  time  in  search  of  Indians ;  that  their  food  at 
length  became  exhausted,  and  they  were  again  reduced  to  the 
prospects  of  starvation.  On  the  second  night  after  their  last 
meal  La  Pierre  observed  something  suspicious  in  the  conduct 
of  Dubois,  Avhich  induced  him  to  be  on  his  guard ;  and  that 
shortly  after  they  had  lain  down  for  the  night,  and  while 
he  feigned  sleep,  he  observed  Dubois  cautiously  opening  his 
clasp-knife,  with  Avhich  he  sprang  at  La  Pierre,  inflicting  on 
the  hand  the  blow  evidently  intended  for  the  neck.  A  silent 
and  desperate  conflict  followed,  in  which,  after  severe  strug- 
gling. La  Pierre  succeeded  in  wresting  the  knife  from  his 
antagonist,  and,  having  no  other  resource  left,  was  finally 
obliged  to  cut  Dubois'  throat.  It  was  several  days  after 
this  that  he  was  discovered  by  the  Indians. 

This  was  one  of  the  earhest,  and  certainly  the  most 
terrible,  of  all  the  tragedies  originating  at  the  Dalles 
des  Morts.  There  are  a  number  of  graves  in  the 
vicinity,  but  more  numerous  still  are  the  inscriptions 


ENCAMPMENT  TO  REVELSTOKE     179 

on  the  cliffs  in  memory  of  the  victims  whose  bodies 
were  never  recovered  for  burial. 

Compared  to  what  we  had  been  having,  lining  down 
Death  Rapids  was  comparatively  simple.  It  was  only 
when  one  got  right  down  beside  them  that  the  terrible 
power  of  the  great  rolling  waves  became  evident. 
From  crest  to  trough  they  must  have  been  from  twelve 
to  fifteen  feet  high,  with  the  water — on  account  of  the 
steep  decHvity  and  the  lack  of  resistance  from  rocks — 
running  at  race-horse  speed.  We  had  become  so  used 
to  expecting  big  boulders  to  underlie  heavy  waves  that 
it  was  difficult  to  realize  that  there  was  all  of  a  hun- 
dred feet  of  green  water  between  these  giant  rollers 
and  the  great  reefs  of  bedrock  which  were  responsi- 
ble for  them. 

For  a  quarter  of  a  mile  below  where  the  rolling 
waves  ceased  to  comb  there  was  a  green-white  chaos 
of  whirlpools  and  the  great  geyser-like  up-boils  where 
the  sucked-down  water  was  ejected  again  to  the  sur- 
face. This  was  another  of  the  places  where  the  river 
was  said  to  "eat  up"  whole  pine  trees  at  high  water, 
and  it  was  not  hard  to  believe.  Even  now  the  vora- 
cious vortices  were  wolfing  very  considerable  pieces 
of  driftwood,  and  one  had  to  keep  a  very  sharp 
lookout  to  see  the  spewed-forth  fragments  reappear 
at  all.  This  was  no  water  for  a  small  boat  or  canoe. 
It  would,  for  instance,  have  engulfed  the  sixteen- 
foot  skiff  which  I  used  on  the  lower  river  as  an 
elephant  gulps  a  tossed  peanut.  But  our  big  double- 
ended  thirty-footer  was  more  of  a  mouthful.  Black- 
more  pushed  off  without  hesitation  as  soon  as  we  had 


180  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

lined  below  the  rollers,  but  not  without  reiterating  the 
old  warning  about  not  dipping  too  deep,  and  being 
quick  about  throwing  the  oar  free  from  its  oar-lock 
if  a  whirlpool  started  to  drag  down  the  blade.  We 
had  a  lively  five  minutes  of  it,  what  with  the  whirl- 
pools trying  to  suck  her  stern  under  and  the  geysers 
trying  to  toss  her  bow  on  high ;  but  they  never  had  us 
in  serious  trouble.  They  did  spin  her  all  the  way 
round,  though,  in  spite  of  all  the  three  of  us  could  do 
to  hold  her,  and  as  for  our  course — a  chart  of  it  would 
make  the  track  cf  an  earthquake  on  a  seismograph 
look  as  if  drawn  with  a  straight-edge! 

Another  mile  took  us  to  the  head  of  Priest  Rapids, 
so  named  because  two  French-Canadian  priests  had 
been  drowned  there.  This  was  to  be  our  great  rapid- 
running  picture.  Bad  light  had  prevented  our  get- 
ting anything  of  the  kind  in  Surprise  and  Kinbasket 
rapids,  and  "Twelve-Mile,"  though  white  and  fast, 
was  hardly  the  real  thing.  But  Priest  Rapids  w^as 
reputed  the  fastest  on  the  whole  river — certainly  over 
twenty  miles  an  hour,  Blackmore  reckoned.  It  had 
almost  as  much  of  a  pitch  as  the  upper  part  of  the 
first  drop  of  Surprise  Rapids  down  to  the  abrupt 
fall.  But,  being  straight  as  a  city  street  and  with 
plenty  of  water  over  the  rocks,  running  it  was  simply 
a  matter  of  having  a  large  enough  boat  and  being 
willing  to  take  the  soaking.  Blackmore  had  the  boat, 
and,  for  the  sake  of  a  real  rip-snorting  picture,  he 
said  he  was  willing  to  take  the  soaking.  So  were 
Andy  and  I. 

We  dropped  Roos  at  the  head  of  the  rumbling 
"intake,"  and  while  Andy  went  down  to  help  him  set 


LOOKING  ACROSS  TO  BOAT  ENCAMPMENT   (above) 
'•WOOD  SMOKE  AT  TWILIGHT"  ABOVE  TWELVE-MILE   (below) 


LINING  DOWN  ROCK  SLIDE  RAPIDS   (above) 

WHEN  THE  COLUMBIA  TOOK   HALF  OF  MY  RIDING 
BREECHES   (beloiv) 


ENCAMPMENT  TO  REVELSTOKE     181 

up  in  a  favourable  position,  Blackmore  and  I  lined 
back  up-stream  a  hundred  yards  so  as  to  have  a  good 
jump  on  when  we  started.  Andy  joined  us  presently, 
to  report  that  Roos  appraised  the  "back-lighting" 
effect  across  the  white  caps  as  "cheap  at  a  million 
dollars."  He  was  going  to  make  the  shot  of  his  life. 
Pushing  off  we  laid  on  our  oars,  floating  down  until 
we  caught  Roos'  signal  to  come  on.  Then  Andy  and 
I  swung  into  it  with  all  of  the  something  like  four 
hundred  and  fifty  pounds  of  beef  we  scaled  between 
us.  Blackmore  headed  her  straight  down  the  "V" 
into  the  swiftest  and  roughest  part  of  the  rapid.  It 
was  a  bit  less  tempestuous  toward  the  right  bank,  but 
a  quiet  passage  was  not  what  he  was  looking  for  this 
trip. 

The  boat  must  have  had  half  her  length  out  of 
water  when  she  hurdled  off  the  top  of  that  first  wave. 
I  couldn't  see,  of  course,  but  I  judged  it  must  have 
been  that  way  from  the  manner  in  which  she  slapped 
down  and  buried  her  nose  under  the  next  comber. 
That  brought  over  the  water  in  a  solid  green  flood. 
Andy  and  I  only  caught  it  on  our  hunched  backs,  but 
Blackmore,  on  his  feet  and  facing  forward,  had  to 
withstand  a  full  frontal  attack.  My  one  recollection 
of  him  during  that  mad  run  is  that  of  a  freshly 
emerged  Neptune  shaking  his  grizzly  locks  and  trying 
to  blink  the  water  out  of  his  eyes. 

Our  team-work,  as  usual,  went  to  sixes-and-sevens 
the  moment  we  hit  the  rough  water,  but  neither  Andy 
nor  I  stopped  pulling  on  that  account.  Yelling  like 
a  couple  of  locoed  Apaches,  we  kept  slapping  out  with 
our  oar-blades  into  every  hmnp  of  water  within  reach. 


182  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

and  I  have  an  idea  that  we  managed  to  keep  a  con- 
siderable way  even  over  the  speeding  current  right 
to  the  finish.  It  was  quite  the  wettest  river  run  I 
ever  made.  A  number  of  times  during  the  war  I  was 
in  a  destroyer  when  something  turned  up  to  send  it 
driving  with  all  the  speed  it  had — or  all  its  plates 
would  stand,  rather — into  a  head  sea.  That  meant 
that  it  made  most  of  the  run  tunnelling  under  water. 
And  that  was  the  way  it  seemed  going  down  Priest 
Rapids,  only  not  so  bad,  of  course.  We  were  only 
about  a  quarter  full  of  water  when  we  finallj^  pulled 
up  to  the  bank  in  an  eddy  to  wait  for  the  movie 
man. 

I  could  see  that  something  had  upset  Roos  by  the 
droop  of  his  shoulders,  even  when  he  was  a  long  way 
off;  the  droop  of  his  mouth  confirmed  the  first  impres- 
sion on  closer  view.  "You  couldn't  do  that  again, 
could  you?"  he  asked  Blackmore,  with  a  furtive  look 
in  his  eyes.  The  "Skipper"  stopped  bailing  with  a 
snort.  "Sure  I'll  do  it  again,"  he  growled  sarcas- 
tically. "Just  line  the  boat  back  where  she  was  and 
I'll  bring  her  down  again — only  not  to-night.  I'll 
want  to  get  dried  out  first.  But  what's  the  matter 
anyhow?    Didn't  we  run  fast  enough  to  suit  you?" 

"Guess  you  ran  fast  enough,"  was  the  reply;  "but 
the  film  didn't.  Buckled  in  camera.  Oil-can!  Wash- 
out! Out  of  luck!"  Engulfed  in  a  deep  purple  aura 
of  gloom,  Roos  climbed  back  into  the  boat  and  asked 
how  far  it  was  to  camp  and  dinner. 

For  a  couple  of  miles  we  had  a  fast  current  with 
us,  but  by  the  time  we  reached  the  mouth  of  Downie 
Creek — the  centre  of  a  great  gold  rush  half  a  century 


ENCAMPMENT  TO  REVELSTOKE     183 

ago — the  river  was  broadening  and  deepening  and 
slowing  down.  A  half  hour  more  of  sharp  pulling 
brought  us  to  Keystone  Creek  and  Boyd's  Ranch, 
where  we  tied  up  for  the  night.  This  place  had  the 
distinction  of  being  the  only  ranch  on  the  Big  Bend, 
but  it  was  really  little  more  than  a  clearing  with  a 
house  and  barn.  Boyd  had  given  his  name  to  a  rapid 
at  the  head  of  Revelstoke  Canyon — drowned  while 
trying  to  line  by  at  high  water,  Blackmore  said — and 
the  present  owner  was  an  American  Civil  War  Pen- 
sioner named  Wilcox.  He  was  wintering  in  Cali- 
fornia for  his  health,  but  Andy,  being  a  friend  of  his, 
knew  where  to  look  for  the  key.  Hardly  had  the 
frying  bacon  started  its  sizzling  prelude  than  there 
came  a  joyous  yowl  at  the  door,  and  as  it  was  opened 
an  enormous  tiger-striped  tomcat  bounded  into  the 
kitchen.  Straight  for  Andy's  shoulder  he  leaped,  and 
the  trapper's  happy  howl  of  recognition  must  have 
met  him  somewhere  in  the  air.  Andy  hugged  the 
ecstatically  purring  bundle  to  his  breast  as  if  it  were 
a  long-lost  child,  telling  us  between  nuzzles  into  the 
arched  furry  back  that  this  was  "Tommy"  (that  was 
his  name,  of  course),  with  whom  he  had  spent  two 
winters  alone  in  his  trapper's  cabin.  It  was  hard  to 
tell  which  was  the  more  delighted  over  this  unex- 
pected reunion,  man  or  cat. 

He  had  little  difficulty  in  accounting  for  "Tom- 
my's" presence  at  Boyd's.  He  had  given  the  cat  to 
Wilcox  a  season  or  two  back,  and  Wilcox,  when  he 
left  for  California,  had  given  him  to  "Wild  Bill," 
who  had  a  cabin  ten  miles  farther  down  the  river. 
"Bill"  already  had  a  brother  of  "Tommy,"  but  a  cat 


184  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

of  much  less  character.  As  "Bill"  was  much  given 
to  periodic  sprees,  Andy  was  satisfied  that  "Tommy," 
who  was  a  great  sizer-up  of  personality,  had  left  him 
in  disgust  and  returned  to  his  former  deserted  home  to 
shift  for  himself.  As  he  would  pull  down  rabbits  as 
readily  as  an  ordinary  cat  caught  mice,  this  was  an 
easy  matter  as  long  as  the  snow  did  not  get  too  deep. 
Of  what  might  happen  after  that  Andy  did  not  like  to 
think.  He  would  have  to  make  some  provision  for  his 
pet  before  full  winter  set  in. 

That  evening  we  sat  around  the  kitchen  fire,  telling 
all  the  cat  stories  we  knew  and  quarrelling  over  whose 
tm-n  it  was  to  hold  "Tommy"  and  put  him  through 
his  tricks.  The  latter  were  of  considerable  variety. 
There  was  all  the  usual  "sit-up,"  "jump-through" 
and  "roll-over"  stuff,  but  with  such  "variations"  as 
only  a  trapper,  snow-bound  for  days  with  nothing 
else  to  do,  would  have  the  time  to  conceive  and  per- 
fect. For  instance,  if  you  only  waved  your  hand  in 
an  airy  spiral,  "Tommy"  would  respond  with  no  more 
than  the  conventional  "once-over;"  but  a  gentle  tweak 
of  the  tail  following  the  spiral,  brought  a  roll  to  the 
left,  while  two  tweaks  directed  him  to  the  right. 
Similarly  with  his  "front"  and  "back"  somersaults, 
which  took  their  insj^iration  from  a  slightly  modified 
form  of  aerial  spiral.  Of  course  only  Andy  could  get 
the  fine  work  out  of  him,  but  the  ordinary  "jump- 
through"  stuff  he  would  do  for  any  of  us. 

I  am  afraid  the  cat  stories  we  told  awakened,  tem- 
porarily at  least,  a  good  deal  of  mutual  distrust.  Roos 
didn't  figure  greatly,  but  Andy  and  Blackmore  and 
I  were  glowering  back  and  forth  at  each  other  with 


ENCAMPMENT  TO  REVELSTOKE     185 

"I-suppose-you-don't-believe-f/ta^^^  expressions  all 
evening.  The  two  woodsmen,  "hunting  in  couples" 
for  the  occasion,  displayed  considerable  team-work. 
One  of  their  best  was  of  a  trapper  of  their  acquain- 
tance— name  and  present  address  mentioned  with 
scrupulous  particularity — who  had  broken  his  leg  one 
winter  on  Maloney  Creek,  just  as  he  was  at  the  end 
of  his  provisions.  Dragging  himself  to  his  cabin,  he 
lay  down  to  die  of  starvation.  The  next  morning  his 
cat  jumped  in  through  the  window  with  a  rabbit  in  his 
mouth.  Then  the  trapper  had  his  great  idea.  Leav- 
ing the  cat  just  enough  to  keep  him  alive,  he  took 
the  rest  for  himself.  That  made  the  cat  go  on  hunt- 
ing, and  each  morning  he  came  back  with  a  rabbit. 
And  so  it  went  on  until  springtime  brought  in  his 
partner  and  relief.  I  asked  them  why,  if  the  cat  was 
so  hungry,  he  didn't  eat  the  rabbit  up  in  the  woods; 
but  they  said  that  wasn't  the  way  of  a  cat,  or  at  least 
of  this  particular  cat. 

Then  I  told  them  of  a  night,  not  long  before  the 
war,  that  I  spent  with  the  German  archaeologists  ex- 
cavating at  Babylon.  Hearing  a  scratching  on  my 
door,  I  got  up  and  found  a  tabby  cat  there.  Enter- 
ing the  room,  she  nosed  about  under  my  mosquito  net- 
ting for  a  few  moments  with  ingratiating  mewings 
and  purrings,  finally  to  trot  out  through  the  open 
door  with  an  "I'11-see-you-again-in-a-moment"  air. 
Presently  she  returned  with  a  new-born  kitten  in  her 
mouth.  Nuzzling  under  the  net  and  coverlets,  she 
deposited  the  mewing  atom  in  my  bed,  and  then  trot- 
ted off  after  another.  When  the  whole  litter  of  five 
was  there,  she  crawled  in  herself  and  started  nursing 


186  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

them.  I  spent  the  night  on  the  couch,  and  without 
a  net. 

According  to  the  best  of  my  judgment,  that  story 
of  mine  was  the  only  true  one  told  that  night.  And 
yet — confound  them — they  wouldn't  believe  it — any 
more  than  I  would  theirs ! 

Considerable  feeling  arose  along  toward  bed-time 
as  to  who  was  going  to  have  "Tommy"  to  sleep  with. 
Roos — who  hadn't  cut  much  ice  in  the  story-telling — 
came  strong  at  this  juncture  by  adopting  cave-man 
tactics  and  simply  picking  "Tommy"  up  and  walking 
off  with  him.  Waiting  until  Roos  was  asleep,  I  crept 
over  and,  gently  extricating  the  furry  pillow  from 
under  his  downy  cheek,  carried  it  off  to  snuggle 
against  my  own  ear.  Whether  Andy  adopted  the 
same  Sabine  methods  himself,  I  never  quite  made 
sure.  Anyhow,  it  was  out  of  his  blankets  that 
"Tommy"  came  crawling  in  the  morning. 

As  we  made  ready  to  pack  off,  Andy  was  in  con- 
siderable doubt  as  to  whether  it  would  be  best  to 
leave  his  pet  where  he  was  or  to  take  him  down  to 
"Wild  Bill"  again.  "Tommy"  cut  the  Gordian  Knot 
himself  by  following  us  down  to  the  boat  like  a  dog 
and  leaping  aboard.  He  was  horribly  upset  for  a 
while  when  he  saw  the  bank  slide  away  from  him  and 
felt  the  motion  of  the  boat,  but  Roos,  muffling  the  dis- 
mal yowls  under  his  coat,  kept  him  fairly  quiet  until 
"Wild  Bill's"  landing  was  reached.  Here  he  became 
his  old  self  again,  following  us  with  his  quick  little 
canine  trot  up  to  the  cabin.  Outside  the  door  he  met 
his  twin  brother,  and  the  two,  after  a  swift  sniff  of 


ENCAMPMENT  TO  REVELSTOKE     187 

identification,   slipped  away  across  the  clearing  to 
stalk  rabbits. 

"Wild  Bill,"  as  Andy  had  anticipated,  was  still  in 
bed,  but  got  up  and  welcomed  us  warmly  as  soon  as 
he  found  who  it  was.  He  was  a  small  man — much 
to  my  surprise,  and  looked  more  like  a  French-Ca- 
nadian gentleman  in  reduced  circumstances  than  the 
most  tumultuous  booze-fighter  on  the  upper  Colum- 
bia. I  had  heard  scores  of  stories  of  his  escapades  in 
the  days  when  Golden  and  Revelstoke  were  wide- 
open  frontier  towns  and  life  was  really  worth  living. 
But  most  of  them  just  miss  being  "drawing-room," 
however,  and  I  refrain  from  setting  them  down. 
There  was  one  comparatively  polite  one,  though,  of 
the  time  he  started  the  biggest  free-for-all  fight  Rev- 
elstoke ever  knew  by  using  the  white,  woolly,  cheek- 
cuddling  poodle  of  a  dance-hall  girl  to  wipe  the  mud 
off  his  boots  with.  And  another — but  no,  that  one 
wouldn't  quite  pass  censor. 

"Bill"  had  shot  a  number  of  bear  in  the  spring, 
and  now  asked  Andy  to  take  the  unusually  fine  skins 
to  Revelstoke  and  sell  them  for  him.  He  also  asked 
if  we  could  let  him  have  any  spare  provisions,  as  he 
was  running  very  short.  He  was  jubilant  when  I 
told  him  he  could  take  ever>i;hing  we  had  left  for 
what  it  had  cost  in  Golden.  That  was  like  finding 
money,  he  said,  for  packing  in  his  stuff  cost  him  close 
to  ten  cents  a  pound.  But  it  wasn't  the  few  dollars 
he  saved  on  the  grub  that  etched  a  silver — nay,  a  ro- 
seate— lining  on  the  sodden  rain  clouds  for  "Wild 
Bill"  that  day;  rather  it  was  the  sequel  to  the  conse- 


188  DOWN  THE  COLU.AIBIA 

quences  of  a  kindly  thought  I  had  when  he  came  down 
to  the  boat  to  see  us  off. 

"  'Bill,'  "  I  said,  as  he  started  to  wring  our  hands 
in  parting,  "they  tell  me  you've  become  a  comparative 
teetotaler  these  last  few  years.  But  we  have  a  little 
'thirty  per  over-proof  left — just  a  swallow.  Per- 
haps— for  the  sake  of  the  old  days   ..." 

That  quick,  chesty  cough,  rumbling  right  from  the 
diaphragm,  was  the  one  deepest  sound  of  emotion  I 
ever  heard — and  I've  heard  a  fair  amount  of  "emot- 
ing," too.  "Don't  mind — if  I  do,"  he  mumbled 
brokenly,  with  a  long  intake  of  breath  that  was  al- 
most a  sob.  I  handed  him  a  mug — a  hulking  big 
half-pint  coffee  mug,  it  was — and  uncorked  the  bot- 
tle.   "Say  when   ..." 

"Thanks — won't  trouble  you,"  he  muttered, 
snatching  the  bottle  from  me  with  a  hand  whose  fin- 
gers crooked  like  claws.  Then  he  inhaled  another 
deep  breath,  took  out  his  handkerchief,  brushed  off  a 
place  on  one  of  the  thwarts,  sat  down,  and,  pouring 
very  deliberately,  emptied  the  contents  of  the  bottle 
to  the  last  drop  into  the  big  mug.  The  bottle — a 
British  Imperial  quart — had  been  a  little  less  than  a 
quarter  full;  the  mug  was  just  short  of  brimming. 
"Earzow!"  he  mumbled,  with  a  sweepingly  compre- 
hensive gesture  with  the  mug.  Then,  crooking  his 
elbow,  he  dumped  the  whole  half  pint  down  his  throat. 
Diluted  four-to-one,  that  liquid  fire  would  have  made 
an  ordinary  man  wince;  and  "Wild  Bill"  downed  it 
without  a  bhnk.  Then  he  wiped  his  lips  with  his 
sleeve,  set  mug  and  bottle  carefully  down  on  the 
thwart,  bowed  low  to  each  of  us,  and  stepped  ashore 


ENCAMPMENT  TO  REVELSTOKE     189 

with  dignified  tread.  Blackmore,  checking  Roos' 
hysterical  giggle  with  a  prod  of  his  paddle  handle, 
pushed  off  into  the  current.  "Wait!"  he  admonished, 
eyeing  the  still  figure  on  the  bank  with  the  fascinated 
glance  of  a  man  watching  a  short  length  of  fuse  sput- 
ter down  toward  the  end  of  a  stick  of  dynamite. 

We  had  not  long  to  wait.  The  detonation  of  the 
dynamite  was  almost  instantaneous.  The  mounting 
fumes  of  that  "thirty  per"  fired  the  slumbering  vol- 
cano of  the  old  trapper  as  a  dash  of  kerosene  fires  a 
bed  of  dormant  coals.  And  so  "Wild  Bill"  went  wild. 
Dancing  and  whooping  like  an  Indian,  he  shouted 
for  us  to  come  back — that  he  would  give  us  his  furs, 
his  cabin,  the  Columbia,  the  Selkirks,  Canada.  .  .  . 
What  he  was  going  to  offer  next  we  never  learned, 
for  just  then  a  very  sobering  thing  occurred — 
"Tommy"  and  his  twin  brother,  attracted  by  the 
noise,  came  trotting  down  the  path  from  the  cabin  to 
learn  what  it  was  all  about. 

Andy  swore  that  he  had  told  "Bill"  that  we  had 
brought  "Tommy"  back,  and  that  "Bill"  had  heard 
him,  and  replied  that  he  hoped  the  cat  would  stay  this 
time.  But  even  if  this  was  true,  it  no  longer  signified. 
"Bill"  had  forgotten  all  about  it,  and  knew  that  there 
ought  to  be  only  one  tiger-striped  tomcat  about  the 
place,  whereas  his  eyes  told  him  there  were  two.  So 
he  kept  counting  them,  and  stopping  every  now  and 
then  to  hold  up  two  fingers  at  us  in  pathetic  puzzle- 
ment. Finallj^  he  began  to  chase  them — or  rather 
"it" — now  one  of  "it"  and  now  the  other.  The  last 
we  saw  of  him,  as  the  current  swept  the  boat  round 
a  point,  he  had  caught  "Tommy's"  twin  brother  and 


190  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

was  still  trying  to  enumerate  "Tommy."  Very  likely 
by  that  time  there  were  two  of  him  in  fancy  as  well 
as  in  fact — possibly  mauve  and  pink  ones. 

Blackmore  took  a  last  whiff  at  the  neck  of  the  rum 
bottle  and  then  tossed  it  gloomily  into  the  river. 
"The  next  time  you  ask  a  man  to  take  a  'swallow,'  "  he 
said,  "probably  you'll  know  enough  to  find  out  how 
big  his  'swallow'  is  in  advance." 

We  pulled  hard  against  a  head  wind  all  morning, 
and  with  not  much  help  from  the  current.  The  latter 
began  to  speed  up  at  Rocky  Point  Rapids,  and  from 
there  the  going  was  lively  right  on  through  Revel- 
stoke  Canyon.  Sand  Slide  Rapid,  a  fast-rolling  ser- 
pentine cascade  near  the  head  of  the  Canyon,  gave  us 
a  good  wetting  as  Blackmore  slashed  down  the  middle 
of  it,  and  he  was  still  bailing  when  we  ran  in  between 
the  sides  of  the  great  red-and-black -walled  gorge. 
Between  cliffs  not  over  a  hundred  feet  apart  for  a 
considerable  distance,  the  river  rushes  with  great  v<e- 
locity,  throwing  itself  in  a  roaring  wave  now  against 
one  side,  now  against  the  other.  As  the  depth  is  very 
great  (Blackmore  said  he  had  failed  to  get  bottom 
with  a  hundred-and-fifty-foot  line) ,  the  only  things  to 
watch  out  for  were  the  cliffs  and  the  whirlpools. 
Neither  was  a  serious  menace  to  a  boat  of  our  size 
at  that  stage  of  water,  but  the  swirls  would  have  made 
the  run  very  dangerous  for  a  skiff  or  canoe  at  any 
time.  Unfortunately,  the  drizzling  rain  and  lowering 
clouds  made  pictures  of  what  is  one  of  the  very  finest 
scenic  stretches  of  the  Big  Bend  quite  out  of  the  ques- 
tion. If  it  had  been  the  matter  of  a  day  or  two,  we 
would  gladly  have  gone  into  camp  and  waited  for  the 


ENCAMPMENT  TO  REVELSTOKE     191 

light;  but  Blackmore  was  inclined  to  think  the  spell 
of  bad  weather  that  had  now  set  in  was  the  beginning 
of  an  early  winter,  in  which  event  we  might  stand-by 
for  weeks  without  seeing  the  sky.  It  was  just  as 
well  we  did  not  wait.  As  I  have  already  mentioned, 
we  did  not  feel  the  touch  of  sunlight  again  until  we 
were  on  the  American  side  of  the  border. 

From  the  foot  of  the  Canyon  to  Blackmore's  boat- 
house  was  four  miles.  Pulling  down  a  broadening  and 
slackening  river  flanked  by  ever  receding  mountains, 
we  passed  under  the  big  C.  P.  R.  bridge  and  tied  up  at 
four  o'clock.  In  spite  of  taking  it  easy  all  the  time, 
the  last  twenty  miles  had  been  run  in  quite  a  bit  under 
two  hours. 


CHAPTER  IX 

EEVELSTOKE    TO    THE    SPOKANE 

The  voyage  round  the  Big  Bend,  in  spite  of  the 
atrocious  weather,  had  gone  so  well  that  I  had  just 
about  made  up  my  mind  to  continue  on  down  river 
by  the  time  we  reached  Revelstoke.  A  letter  which 
awaited  me  at  the  hotel  there  from  Captain  Arm- 
strong, stating  that  he  would  be  free  to  join  me  for 
my  first  week  or  ten  days  south  from  the  foot  of  the 
lakes,  was  all  that  was  needed  to  bring  me  to  a  de- 
cision. I  wired  him  that  I  would  pick  him  up  in  Nel- 
son as  soon  as  I  had  cleaned  up  a  pile  of  correspon- 
dence which  had  pursued  me  in  spite  of  all  directions 
to  the  contrary,  and  in  the  meantime  for  him  to  en- 
deavour to  find  a  suitable  boat.  Nelson,  as  the  me- 
tropolis of  western  British  Columbia,  appeared  to  be 
the  only  place  where  we  would  have  a  chance  of  find- 
ing what  was  needed  in  the  boat  line  on  short  notice. 
While  I  wrote  letters,  Roos  got  his  exposed  film  off 
to  Los  Angeles,  laid  in  a  new  stock,  and  received 
additional  instructions  from  Chester  in  connection 
with  the  new  picture — the  one  for  which  the  opening 
shots  had  already  been  made  at  Windermere,  and 
which  we  called  "The  Farmer  Who  Would  See  the 
Sea." 

As  there  was  no  swift  water  whatever  between  Rev- 
elstoke and  Kootenay  Rapids,  I  had  no  hesitation  in 

192 


REVELSTOKE  TO  THE  SPOKANE     193 

deciding  to  make  the  voyage  down  the  Arrow  Lakes 
by  steamer.  Both  on  the  score  of  water-stage  and 
weather,  it  was  now  a  good  month  to  six  weeks  later 
than  the  most  favourable  time  for  a  through  down- 
river voyage.  Any  time  saved  now,  therefore,  might 
be  the  means  of  avoiding  so  many  days  of  winter  fur- 
ther along.  I  was  hoping  that,  with  decreasing  alti- 
tude and  a  less  humid  region  ahead,  I  would  at  least 
be  keeping  ahead  of  the  snows  nearly  if  not  quite  all 
the  way  to  Portland.  I  may  mention  here  that,  all 
in  all,  I  played  in  very  good  luck  on  the  score  of 
weather.  There  were  to  be,  however,  a  few  geesly 
cold  days  on  the  river  along  about  Wenatchee,  and 
two  or  three  mighty  blustery  blows  in  the  Cascades. 
The  Arrow  Lakes  are  merely  enlargements  of  the 
Columbia,  keeping  throughout  their  lengths  the  same 
general  north-to-south  direction  of  this  part  of  the 
river.  The  upper  lake  is  thirty-three  miles  in  length, 
and  has  an  average  width  of  about  three  miles.  Six- 
teen miles  of  comparatively  swift  river  runs  from  the 
upper  to  the  lower  lake.  The  latter,  which  is  forty- 
two  miles  long  and  two  and  a  half  wide,  is  somewhat 
less  precipitously  walled  than  the  upper  lake,  and 
there  are  considerable  patches  of  cultivation  here  and 
there  along  its  banks — mostly  apple  orchards.  There 
is  a  steamer  channel  all  the  way  up  the  Columbia  to 
Revelstoke,  but  the  present  service,  maintained  by 
the  Canadian  Pacific  at  its  usual  high  standard,  starts 
at  the  head  of  the  upper  lake  and  finishes  at  West 
Robson,  some  miles  down  the  Columbia  from  the  foot 
of  the  lower  lake.  This  is  one  of  the  very  finest  lake 
trips  anywhere  in  the  world;  I  found  it  an  unending 


194  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

source  of  delight,  even  after  a  fortnight  of  the  su- 
perhitive  scenery  of  the  Big  Bend. 

There  is  a  stock  story  they  tell  of  the  Arrow  Lakes, 
and  which  aj^pears  intended  to  convey  to  the  simple 
tourist  a  graphic  idea  of  the  precipitousness  of  their 
rocky  walls.  The  skipper  of  my  steamer  told  it  while 
we  were  ploughing  down  the  upper  lake.  Seeing  a 
man  struggling  in  the  water  near  the  bank  one  day, 
he  ran  some  distance  off  his  course  to  throw  the  chap 
a  line.  Disdaining  all  aid,  the  fellow  kept  right  on 
swimming  toward  the  shore.  "Don't  worry  about 
me,"  he  shouted  back;  "this  is  only  the  third  time 
I've  fallen  off  my  ranch  to-day." 

I  told  the  Captain  that  the  story  sounded  all  right 
to  me  except  in  one  particular — that  even  my  glass 
failed  to  reveal  any  ranches  for  a  man  to  fall  off  of. 
"Oh,  that's  all  right,"  was  the  unperturbed  reply; 
"there  tvas  one  when  that  yarn  was  started,  but  I 
guess  it  fell  into  the  lake  too.  But  mebbe  I  had  ouglit 
to  keep  it  for  the  lower  lake,  though,"  he  added; 
"there  is  still  some  un-slid  ranches  down  there." 

Nelson  is  a  fine  little  city  that  hangs  to  a  rocky 
mountainside  right  at  the  point  where  Kootenay  Lake 
spills  over  and  discharges  its  surplus  water  into  a 
wild,  white  torrent  that  seems  to  be  trying  to  atone 
at  the  last  for  its  long  delay  in  making  up  its  mind 
to  join  the  Columbia.  Nelson  was  made  by  the  rich 
silver-lead  mines  of  the  Kootenay  district,  but  it  was 
so  well  made  that,  even  now  with  the  first  fine  frenzy 
of  the  mining  excitement  over,  it  is  still  able  to  carry 
on  strongly  as  a  commercial  distributing  and  fruit 
shipping  centre.    It  is  peopled  by  the  same  fine,  out- 


REVELSTOKE  TO  THE  SPOKANE     195 

door  loving  folk  that  one  finds  through  all  of  western 
Canada,  and  is  especially  noted  for  its  aquatic  sports. 
I  am  only  sorry  that  I  was  not  able  to  see  more  of 
both  Nelson  and  its  people. 

As  soon  as  I  saw  Captain  Armstrong  I  made  a 
clean  breast  to  him  about  my  failure  to  unearth  the 
treasure  at  the  Bend.  He  was  a  good  sport  and  bore 
up  better  than  one  would  expect  a  man  to  under  the 

circumstances.     "I  wish  that  matter  of  K and 

his  D.  T.'s  had  come  up  before  you  left,"  was  his  only 
comment. 

"Why?"  I  asked.  "I  can't  see  what  difference  that 
would  have  made.  We  didn't  waste  a  lot  of  time 
digging." 

"That's  just  it,"  said  the  Captain  with  a  wry  grin. 
"Wouldn't  you  have  gone  right  on  digging  if  you 
had  known  that  the  spell  of  jim-jams  that  finished 
K came  from  some  stuff  he  got  from  a  section- 
hand  at  Bea vermouth?  Now  I  suppose  I'll  have  to 
watch  my  chance  and  run  down  and  salvage  that  keg 
of  old  Scotch  myself."  It  shows  the  stuff  that  Arm- 
strong was  made  of  when  I  say  that,  even  after  the 
way  I  had  betrayed  the  trust  he  had  reposed  in  me, 
he  was  still  game  to  go  on  with  the  Columbia  trip. 
That's  the  sort  of  man  he  was. 

Boats  of  anywhere  near  the  design  we  would  need 
for  the  river  were  scarce,  the  Captain  reported,  but 
there  was  one  which  he  thought  might  do.  This 
proved  to  be  a  sixteen-foot,  clinker-built  skiff  that  had 
been  constructed  especially  to  carry  an  out-board 
motor.  She  had  ample  beam,  a  fair  freeboard  and  a 
considerable  sheer.     The  principal  thing  against  her 


196  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

was  the  square  stern,  and  that  was  of  less  moment 
running  down  river  than  if  we  had  been  working  up. 
It  did  seem  just  a  bit  like  asking  for  trouble,  tack- 
ling the  Columbia  in  a  boat  built  entirely  for  lake  use; 
but  Captain  Armstrong's  approval  of  her  was  quite 
good  enough  for  me.  Save  for  her  amiable  weakness 
of  yielding  somewhat  overreadily  to  the  seductive  em- 
braces of  whirlpools — a  trait  common  to  all  square- 
sterned  craft  of  inconsiderable  length — she  proved 
more  than  equal  to  the  task  set  for  her.  We  paid 
fifty-five  dollars  for  her — about  half  what  she  had 
cost — and  there  was  a  charge  of  ten  dollars  for  ex- 
pressing her  to  West  Robson,  on  the  Columbia. 

We  left  Nelson  by  train  for  Castlegar,  on  the  Co- 
lumbia just  below  West  Robson,  the  afternoon  of 
October  nineteenth.  The  track  runs  in  sight  of  the 
Kootenay  practically  all  of  the  way.  There  is  a  drop 
of  three  hundred  and  fifty  feet  in  the  twenty-eight 
miles  of  river  between  the  outlet  of  the  lake  and  the 
Columbia,  with  no  considerable  stretch  that  it  would 
be  safe  to  run  with  a  boat.  A  large  part  of  the  drop 
occurs  in  two  fine  cataracts  called  Bonnington  Falls, 
where  there  is  an  important  hydro-electric  plant,  serv- 
ing Nelson  and  Trail  with  power;  but  most  of  the 
rest  of  the  way  the  river  is  one  continuous  series  of 
foam-white  cascades  with  short  quiet  stretches  be- 
tween. The  last  two  or  three  miles  to  the  river  the 
railway  runs  through  the  remarkable  colony  of  Rus- 
sian Doukobours,  with  a  station  at  Brilliant,  where 
their  big  co-operative  jam  factory  and  administrative 
offices  are  located.    We  had  a  more  intimate  glimpse 


REVELSTOKE  TO  THE  SPOKANE     197 

of  this  interesting  colony  from  the  river  the  following 
day. 

We  found  the  express  car  with  the  boat  on  the  sid- 
ing at  West  Robson,  and  the  three  of  us — Arm- 
strong, Roos  and  myself — had  little  difficulty  in  slid- 
ing her  down  the  quay  and  launching  her  in  the  Co- 
lumbia. Pulling  a  mile  down  the  quiet  current,  we 
tied  her  up  for  the  night  at  the  Castlegar  Ferry. 
Then  we  cut  across  the  bend  through  the  woods  for  a 
look  at  Kootenay  Rapids,  the  first  stretch  of  fast 
water  we  were  to  encounter.  After  the  rough-and- 
rowdy  rapids  of  the  Big  Bend,  this  quarter-mile  of 
white  riffle  looked  like  comparatively  easy  running. 
It  was  a  very  different  sort  of  a  craft  we  had  now, 
however,  and  Armstrong  took  the  occasion  to  give  the 
channel  a  careful  study.  There  were  a  lot  of  big  black 
rocks  cropping  up  all  the  way  across,  but  he  thought 
that,  by  keeping  well  in  toward  the  right  bank,  we 
could  make  it  without  much  trouble. 

On  the  way  back  to  the  hotel  at  Castlegar,  the 
Captain  was  hailed  from  the  doorway  of  a  cabin  set 
in  the  midst  of  a  fresh  bit  of  clearing.  It  turned  out 
to  be  a  boatman  who  had  accompanied  him  and  Mr. 
Forde,  of  the  Canadian  Department  of  Public 
Works,  on  a  part  of  their  voyage  down  the  Columbia 
in  1915.  They  reminisced  for  half  an  hour  in  the 
gathering  twilight,  talking  mostly  of  the  occasion 
when  a  whirlpool  had  stood  their  Peterboro  on  end 
in  the  Little  Dalles.  I  found  this  just  a  bit  disturb- 
ing, for  Armstrong  had  already  confided  to  me  that 
he  intended  running  the  Little  Dalles. 


198  DOWN  THE  COLUxMBIA 

The  boat  trimmed  well  when  we  came  to  stow  the 
load  the  next  morning,  but  when  the  three  of  us  took 
our  places  she  was  rather  lower  in  the  water  than  we 
had  expected  she  was  going  to  be.  She  seemed  very 
small  after  Blackmore's  big  thirty-footer,  and  the 
water  uncomfortably  close  at  hand.  She  was  buoy- 
ant enough  out  in  the  current,  however,  and  responded 
very  smartly  to  paddle  and  oars  when  Armstrong  and 
I  tried  a  few  practice  manoeuvres.  The  Captain  sat 
on  his  bedding  roll  in  the  stern,  plying  his  long  pad- 
dle, and  I  pulled  a  pair  of  oars  from  the  forward 
thwart.  Roos  sat  on  the  after  thwart,  facing  Arm- 
strong, with  his  tri23od,  camera  and  most  of  the  lug- 
gage stowed  between  them.  She  was  loaded  to  ride 
high  by  the  head,  as  it  was  white  water  rather  than 
whirlpools  that  was  in  immediate  prospect.  With  a 
small  boat  and  a  consequent  comparatively  small 
margin  of  safety,  one  has  to  make  his  trim  a  sort  of  a 
compromise.  For  rough,  sloppy  rapids  it  is  well  to 
have  the  bows  just  about  as  high  in  the  air  as  you  can 
get  them.  On  the  other  hand,  it  is  likely  to  be  fatal 
to  get  into  a  bad  whirlpool  with  her  too  much  down 
by  the  stern.  As  the  one  succeeds  the  other  as  a  gen- 
eral rule,  about  the  best  you  can  do  is  to  strike  a  com- 
fortable mean  based  on  what  you  know  of  the  water 
ahead. 

I  found  it  very  awkward  for  a  while  pulling  with 
two  oars  after  having  worked  for  so  long  with  one, 
and  this  difficulty — especially  in  bad  water — I  never 
quite  overcame.  In  a  really  rough  rapid  one  oar  is 
all  a  man  can  handle  properly,  and  he  does  well  if  he 
manages  that.    Your  stroke  is  largely  determined  by 


BONNINGTON  FALLS  OF  THE  KOOTENAY   (ahove) 
PLASTERED  LOG   CABIN   IN   THE  DOUKHOBOR  VILLAGE    (below) 


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REVELSTOKE  TO  THE  SPOKANE     199 

the  sort  of  stuff  the  blade  is  going  into,  and — as  on 
the  verge  of  an  eddy — with  the  water  to  port  running 
in  one  direction,  and  that  to  starboard  running 
another,  it  is  obviously  impossible  for  a  man  handling 
two  oars  to  do  full  justice  to  the  situation.  He  sim- 
ply has  to  do  the  best  he  can  and  leave  the  rest  to  the 
man  with  the  paddle  in  the  stern.  When  the  latter 
is  an  expert  with  the  experience  of  Captain  Arm- 
strong there  is  little  likelihood  of  serious  trouble. 

The  matter  of  keeping  a  lookout  is  also  much  more 
difficult  in  a  small  boat.  In  a  craft  with  only  a  few 
inches  of  freeboard  it  is  obviously  out  of  the  question 
for  a  steersman  to  keep  his  feet  through  a  rapid,  as 
he  may  do  without  risk  in  a  batteau  or  canoe  large 
enough  to  give  him  a  chance  to  brace  his  knees  against 
the  sides.  Armstrong  effected  the  best  compromise 
possible  by  standing  and  getting  a  good  "look-see" 
while  he  could,  and  then  settling  back  into  a  securer 
position  when  the  boat  struck  the  rough  water.  The 
three  or  four  feet  less  of  vantage  from  which  to  con 
the  channel  imposes  a  good  deal  of  a  handicap,  but 
there  is  no  help  for  it. 

We  ran  both  pitches  of  Kootenay  Rapids  easily 
and  smartly.  Her  bows  slapped  down  pretty  hard 
when  she  tumbled  off  the  tops  of  some  of  the  bigger 
rollers,  but  into  not  the  softest  of  the  souse-holes 
would  she  put  her  high-held  head.  We  took  in  plenty 
of  spray,  but  nothing  green — nothing  that  couldn't 
be  bailed  without  stopping.  It  was  a  lot  better  per- 
formance than  one  was  entitled  to  expect  of  a  lake 
boat  running  her  maiden  rapid. 

"She'll  do!"  chuckled  the  Captain  with  a  satisfied 


200  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

grin,  resting  on  his  paddle  as  we  slid  easily  out  of  the 
final  run  of  swirls;  "you  ought  to  take  her  right 
through  without  a  lot  of  trouble."  '' Imsliallahr  I 
interjected  piously,  anxious  not  to  offend  the  River 
God  with  a  display  of  overmuch  confidence.  I  began 
to  call  her  "Imshallah"  in  my  mind  from  that  time  on, 
and  "Imshallah" — "God  willing" — she  remained 
until  I  tied  her  up  for  her  well-earned  rest  in  a  Port- 
land boat-house.  It  was  in  the  course  of  the  next  day 
or  two  that  I  made  a  propitiatory  offering  to  the 
River  God  in  the  form  of  the  remnants  of  the  jodpurs 
he  had  tried  so  hard  to  snatch  from  me  at  Rock  Shde 
Rapids.  I've  always  had  a  sneaking  feeling  offerings 
of  that  kind  are  "good  medicine;"  that  the  old  Greeks 
knew  what  they  were  doing  when  they  squared  things 
with  the  Gods  in  advance  on  venturing  forth  into  un- 
known waters. 

Big  and  Little  Tin  Cup  Rapids,  which  are  due  to 
the  obstruction  caused  by  boulders  washed  down  by 
the  torrential  Kootenay  River,  gave  us  little  trouble. 
There  is  a  channel  of  good  depth  right  down  the  mid- 
dle of  both,  and  we  splashed  through  tliis  without 
getting  into  much  besides  flying  foam.  Just  below 
we  pulled  up  to  the  left  bank  and  landed  for  a  look  at 
one  of  the  Doukobour  villages. 

The  Doukobours  are  a  strange  Russian  religious 
sect,  with  beliefs  and  observances  quite  at  variance 
with  those  of  the  Greek  Church.  Indeed,  it  was  the 
persecutions  of  the  Orthodox  Russians  that  were  re- 
sponsible for  driving  considerable  numbers  of  them  to 
Canada.  They  are  best  known  in  America,  not  for 
their  indefatigable  industry  and  many  other  good 


REVELSTOKE  TO  THE  SPOKANE     201 

traits,  but  for  their  highly  original  form  of  protesting 
when  they  have  fancied  that  certain  of  their  rights 
were  being  restricted  by  Canadian  law.  On  repeated 
occasions  of  this  kind  whole  colonies  of  them — men, 
women  and  children — ^have  thrown  aside  their  every 
rag  of  clothing  and  started  off  marching  about  the 
country.  Perhaps  it  is  not  strange  that  more  has 
been  written  about  these  strange  pilgrimages  than  of 
the  fact  that  the  Doukobours  have  cleared  and 
brought  to  a  high  state  of  productivity  many  square 
miles  of  land  that,  but  for  their  unflagging  energy, 
would  still  be  worthless.  In  spite  of  their  somewhat 
unconventional  habits,  these  simple  people  have  been 
an  incalculably  valuable  economic  asset  to  western 
Canada. 

On  the  off  chance  that  there  might  be  an  incipient 
"protest"  brewing,  Roos  took  his  movie  outfit  ashore 
with  him.  He  met  with  no  luck.  Indeed,  we  found 
the  women  of  the  astonishingly  clean  little  village  of 
plastered  and  whitewashed  cabins  extremely  shy  of 
even  our  hand  cameras.  The  Captain  thought  that 
this  was  probably  due  to  the  fact  that  they  had  been 
a  good  deal  pestered  by  kodak  fiends  while  Godiva- 
ing  round  the  country  on  some  of  their  protest 
marches.  "The  people  were  very  indignant  about  it," 
he  said;  "but  I  never  heard  of  any  one  pulling 
down  their  blinds,"  Coventry  was  really  very  "Vic- 
torian" in  its  attitude  toward  Lady  Godiva's  "pro- 
test." 

There  was  good  swift  water  all  the  way  from  Cas- 
tlegar  to  Trail,  and  we  averaged  close  to  nine  miles  an 
hour  during  the  time  we  were  on  the  river.    At  China 


202  DOWN  THE  COLU^NIBIA 

Bar  the  river  was  a  good  deal  spread  out,  running  in 
channels  between  low  gravel  islands.  Any  one  of 
these  was  runnable  for  a  small  boat,  and  we  did  not 
need  to  keep  to  the  main  channel  that  had  once  been 
maintained  for  steamers.  Sixteen  miles  below  Cas- 
tlegar,  and  about  half  a  mile  below  the  mouth  of  Sul- 
livan Creek,  there  was  a  long  black  reef  of  basaltic 
rock  stretching  a  third  of  the  way  across  the  river. 
We  shot  past  it  without  difficulty  by  keeping  near  the 
left  bank.  The  sulphurous  fumes  of  the  big  smelter 
blotching  the  southern  sky  with  saffron  and  coppery 
red  clouds  indicated  that  we  were  nearing  Trail.  The 
stacks,  with  the  town  below  and  beyond,  came  into 
view  just  as  we  hit  the  head  of  a  fast-running  riffle. 
We  ran  the  last  half  mile  at  a  swift  clip,  pulling  up 
into  about  the  only  place  that  looked  like  an  eddy  on 
the  Trail  side  of  the  river.  That  this  proved  to  be  the 
slack  water  behind  the  crumbling  city  dump  could  not 
be  helped.  He  who  rides  the  rumiing  road  cannot  be 
too  particular  about  his  landing  places. 

We  reached  Trail  before  noon,  and,  so  far  as  time 
was  concerned,  could  just  as  well  have  run  right  on 
across  the  American  line  to  Northport  that  afternoon. 
However,  October  twenty-first  turned  out  to  be  a 
date  of  considerable  importance  to  British  Colum- 
bians, for  it  was  the  day  of  the  election  to  determine 
whether  that  province  should  continue  dry  or,  as  the 
proponents  of  wetness  euphemized  it,  return  to 
"moderation."  As  there  was  a  special  provision  by 
which  voters  absent  from  their  place  of  registration 
could  cast  their  ballots  wherever  they  chanced  to  be. 
Captain  Armstrong  was  anxious  to  stop  over  and  do 


REVELSTOKE  TO  THE  SPOKANE     203 

his  bit  for  "moderation."  Indeed,  I  was  a  bit  worried 
at  first  for  fear,  by  way  of  compensating  in  a  measure 
for  the  injury  we  had  done  him  in  faihng  to  come 
through  with  the  treasure  from  the  Big  Bend,  he 
would  expect  Roos  and  me  to  put  in  a  few  absentee 
ballots  for  "moderation."  There  was  a  rumour  about 
that  a  vote  for  "moderation"  would  be  later  redeema- 
ble— in  case  "moderation"  carried,  of  course — in  the 
voter's  weight  of  the  old  familiar  juice.  I  never  got 
further  than  a  pencilled  computation  on  the  "temper- 
ance" bar  of  the  Crown  Point  Hotel  that  two  hundred 
and  thirty-five  pounds  (I  was  down  to  that  by  now) 
would  work  out  to  something  like  one  hundred  seven- 
teen and  a  half  quarts.  This  on  the  rule  that  "A 
pint's  a  pound,  the  world  round."  That  was  as  far 
as  I  got,  I  say,  for  there  seemed  rather  too  much  of  a 
chance  of  international  complications  sooner  or  later. 
But  I  am  still  wondering  just  what  is  the  law  cover- 
ing the  case  of  a  man  who  sells  his  vote  in  a  foreign 
country — and  for  his  weight  in  whisky  that  he  would 
probably  never  have  delivered  to  him.  I  doubt  very 
much  if  there  is  any  precedent  to  go  by. 

Between  votes — or  rather  before  Captain  Arm- 
strong voted — we  took  the  occasion  to  go  over  the 
smelter  of  the  Consolidated  Mining  and  Smelting 
Company.  It  is  one  of  the  most  modern  plants  of  its 
kind  in  the  world,  and  treats  ore  from  all  over  western 
Canada.  We  were  greatly  interested  in  the  recently 
installed  zinc-leaching  plant  for  the  handling  of  an 
especially  refractory  ore  from  the  company's  own 
mine  in  the  Kootenays.  This  ore  had  resisted  for 
years  every  attempt  to  extract  its  zinc  at  a  profit. 


204  DOWN  THE  COLUINIBIA 

and  the  perfection  of  the  intricate  process  through 
which  it  is  now  put  at  Trail  has  made  a  mine,  which 
would  otherwise  have  remained  practically  valueless, 
worth  untold  millions.  The  two  thousand  and  more 
employes  of  the  smelter  are  the  main  factor  in  the 
prosperity  of  this  live  and  by  no  means  unattractive 
little  town. 

We  had  two  very  emphatic  warnings  before  leaving 
Trail  the  next  morning — one  was  on  no  account  to 
attempt  to  take  any  drinkables  across  the  line  by  the 
river,  and  the  other  was  to  keep  a  weather  eye  lifting 
in  running  the  rapids  at  the  Rock  Islands,  two  miles 
below  town.  As  we  reached  the  latter  before  we  did 
the  International  Boundary  Line,  we  started  'ware- 
ing  the  rapids  first.  This  was  by  no  means  as  empty 
a  warning  as  many  I  was  to  have  later.  The  islands 
proved  to  be  two  enormous  granite  rocks,  between 
which  the  river  rushed  with  great  velocity.  The  Cap- 
tain headed  the  boat  into  the  deep,  swift  channel  to 
the  right,  avoiding  by  a  couple  of  yards  a  walloping 
whale  of  a  whirlpool  that  came  spinning  right  past 
the  bow.  I  didn't  see  it,  of  course,  until  it  passed 
astern;  but  it  looked  to  me  then  as  though  its  whirl- 
ing centre  was  depressed  a  good  three  feet  below  the 
surface  of  the  river,  and  with  a  black,  bottomless  fun- 
nel opening  out  of  that.  I  was  just  about  to  register 
"nonchalance"  by  getting  off  my  "all-day-sucker" 
joke,  when  I  suddenly  felt  the  thwart  beneath  me 
begin  to  push  upwards  like  the  floor  of  a  jerkily- 
started  elevator,  only  with  a  rotary  action.  Fanning 
empty  air  with  both  oars,  I  was  saved  from  falling 
backwards  by  the  forty-five  degree  up-tilt  of  the  boat. 


REVELSTOKE  TO  THE  SPOKANE     205 

Way  beneath  me — down  below  the  surface  of  the  river 
— Armstrong,  pop-eyed,  was  leaning  sharply  for- 
ward to  keep  from  being  dumped  out  over  the  stern. 
Roos,  with  a  death-grip  on  either  gunwale,  was  try- 
ing to  keep  from  falling  into  the  Captain's  lap.  Round 
we  went  like  a  prancing  horse,  and  just  as  the  boat 
had  completed  the  hundred  and  eighty  degrees  that 
headed  her  momentarily  up-river,  something  seemed 
to  drop  away  beneath  her  bottom,  and  as  she  sunk 
into  the  hole  there  came  a  great  snorting  "ku-whouf !" 
and  about  a  barrel  of  water  came  pouring  its  solid 
green  flood  over  the  stern  and,  incidentally,  the  Cap- 
tain. A  couple  of  seconds  later  the  boat  had  com- 
pleted her  round  and  settled  back  on  a  comparatively 
even  keel  as  hard-plied  oars  and  paddle  wrenched 
her  out  of  the  grip  of  the  Thing  that  had  held  her  in 
its  clutch.  I  saw  it  plainly  as  it  did  its  dervish  dance 
of  disappointment  as  we  drew  away.  It  looked  to 
me  not  over  half  as  large  as  that  first  one  which  the 
Captain  had  so  cleverly  avoided. 

"That  was  about  the  way  we  got  caught  in  the 
Little  Dalles,"  observed  Armstrong  when  we  were  in 
quieter  water  again.  "Only  it  was  a  worse  whirlpool 
than  that  one  that  did  it.  This  square  stern  gives  the 
water  more  of  a  grip  than  it  can  get  on  a  canoe.  We'll 
have  to  watch  out  for  it." 

Save  over  a  broad,  shallow  bar  across  the  current  at 
the  mouth  of  the  Salmon,  there  was  deep,  swift  water 
all  the  way  to  Waneta,  the  Canadian  Customs  sta- 
tion. Here  we  landed  Roos  to  await  the  morning 
train  from  Nelson  to  Spokane  and  go  through  to 
Northport  to  arrange  the  American  Customs  formal- 


206  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

ities.  At  a  final  conference  we  decided  to  heed  the 
warning  about  not  attempting  to  carry  any  drinkables 
openly  into  the  United  States.  Stowing  what  little 
there  was  left  where  not  the  most  lynx-eyed  or  ferret- 
nosed  Customs  Officer  could  ever  get  at  it,  we  pushed 
off. 

There  is  a  fairly  fast  current  all  the  way  to  North- 
port,  but  from  the  fact  that  we  made  the  eleven  miles 
in  about  three-quarters  of  an  hour,  it  seems  likely 
that,  between  paddle  and  oars,  the  boat  was  driven 
somewhat  faster  than  the  Columbia.  Just  below 
AVaneta  and  immediately  above  the  International 
Boundary  Line,  the  Pend  d'Oreille  or  Clark's  Fork 
flows,  or  rather  falls  into  the  Columbia.  This  really 
magnificent  stream  comes  tumbling  dow^n  a  sheer- 
walled  gorge  in  fall  after  fall,  several  of  which  can 
be  seen  in  narrowing  perspective  from  the  Columbia 
itself.  Its  final  leap  is  over  a  ten-feet-high  ledge 
which  extends  all  the  way  across  its  two-hundred-feet- 
wide  mouth.  Above  this  fine  cataract  it  is  the  Pend 
d'Oreille,  below  it,  the  Columbia.  I  know  of  no  place 
where  two  such  rivers  come  together  with  such  fine 
spectacular  effect,  in  a  way  so  fitting  to  the  character 
of  each. 

The  Pend  d'Oreille  is  generally  rated  as  the  prin- 
cipal tributary  of  the  upper  Columbia.  Although  the 
Kootenay — because  it  flows  through  a  region  of  con- 
siderably greater  annual  rainfall — carries  rather  the 
more  water  of  the  two,  the  Pend  d'Oreille  is  longer 
and  drains  a  far  more  extensive  watershed — that  lying 
between  the  main  chain  of  the  Rockies  and  the  Bitter 
Root  and  Coeur  d'Alene  ranges.     Great  as  is  the 


REVELSTOKE  TO  THE  SPOKANE     207 

combined  discharge  of  these  two  fine  rivers,  their 
effect  on  the  Columbia  is  not  apparent  to  the  eye.  If 
anything,  the  latter  looks  a  bigger  stream  where  it 
flows  out  of  the  lower  Arrow  Lake,  above  the  Koote- 
nay,  than  it  does  where  it  crosses  the  American  Line 
below  the  Pend  d'Oreille.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  its 
flow  must  be  nearly  doubled  at  the  latter  point,  but 
the  swifter  current  reduces  its  apparent  volume. 
Nothing  but  the  most  careful  computations,  based 
on  speed  of  current  and  area  of  cross-section,  will  give 
anything  approximating  the  real  discharge  of  a  river. 

I  was  a  good  deal  interested  in  the  Pend  d'Oreille, 
because  it  was  on  one  of  its  upper  tributaries,  the 
Flathead  in  Montana,  that  I  had  made  my  first  timid 
effort  at  rapid-running  a  good  many  years  previously. 
It  hadn't  been  a  brilliant  success — for  two  logs  tied 
together  with  ropes  hardly  make  the  ideal  of  a  raft; 
but  the  glamour  of  the  hare-brained  stunt  had  sur- 
vived the  wetting.  I  should  dearly  have  loved  to  ex- 
plore that  wonderful  black-walled  canyon,  with  its 
unending  succession  of  cataracts  and  cascades,  but 
lack  of  time  forbade.  The  drizzling  rain  made  it  im- 
possible even  to  get  a  good  photograph  of  the  fine 
frenzy  of  that  final  mad  leap  into  the  Columbia. 

It  was  funny  the  way  that  rain  acted.  For  some- 
thing like  a  month  now  there  had  been  only  two  or 
three  days  of  reasonably  fair  weather,  and  for  the  last 
fortnight  the  sun  had  hardly  been  glimpsed  at  all. 
Pulling  up  to  Waneta  in  a  clammy  drizzle,  Captain 
Armstrong  remarked,  as  he  drew  the  collar  of  his 
water-proof  closer  to  decrease  the  drainage  down  the 
back  of  his  neck,  that  he  reckoned  they  wouldn't  stand 


208  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

for  weather  of  that  kind  over  in  "God's  Country."  As 
there  was  nothing  but  sodden  clouds  to  the  southward, 
I  didn't  feel  like  giving  him  any  definite  assurance 
on  the  point  at  the  moment.  However,  when  we 
crossed  the  Line  an  hour  later  the  rain  had  ceased.  A 
couple  of  miles  farther  down  the  clouds  were  break- 
ing up,  and  at  Northport  the  sun  was  shining.  I  did 
not  have  another  rainy  day,  nor  even  one  more  than 
slightly  overcast,  until  I  was  almost  at  the  Cascades. 
I  trust  my  good  Canadian  friend  was  as  deeply  im- 
pressed as  he  claimed  to  be. 

Beyond  a  sharp  riffle  between  jagged  rock  islands 
above  Deadman's  Eddy,  and  one  or  two  shallow  boul- 
der bars  where  the  channels  were  a  bit  obscure,  it  was 
good  open-and-above-board  water  all  the  way  to 
Northport.  The  "Eddy"  is  a  whirling  back-sweep 
of  water  at  a  bend  of  the  river,  and  is  supposed  to  hold 
up  for  inspection  everything  floatable  that  the  Colum- 
bia brings  down  from  Canada.  "Funny  they  never 
thought  of  calling  it  'Customs  Eddy,'  "  Armstrong 
said.  From  the  condition  of  its  littered  banks,  it 
looked  to  be  almost  as  prolific  of  "pickings"  as  the 
great  drift  pile  of  Kinbasket  Lake.  Being  near  a 
town,  however,  it  is  doubtless  much  more  thoroughly 
gone  over. 

We  tied  up  below  the  Ferry  at  Northport,  which 
was  the  rendezvous  to  which  Boos  was  to  bring  the 
Customs  Inspector.  The  ferrj^-man,  who  had  once 
seen  Captain  Armstrong  run  the  rapids  of  the  upper 
Kootenay  with  one  of  his  steamers,  was  greatly  elated 
over  having  such  a  notable  walking  the  quarterdeck 
of  his  own  humble  craft.     Armstrong,  in  turn,  was 


REVELSTOKE  TO  THE  SPOKANE     209 

scarcely  less  excited  over  an  automatic  pumping  con- 
trivance which  the  ferry-man  had  rigged  up  to  keep 
his  pontoons  dry.  After  waiting  for  an  hour,  we  took 
our  bags  and  walked  up  to  the  hotel  on  the  main 
street  at  the  top  of  the  bluff.  We  found  Roos  in  the 
office  reading  a  last  year's  haberdashery  catalogue. 
He  said  he  had  not  expected  us  for  a  couple  of  hours 
yet,  and  that  he  had  arranged  for  inspection  at  three 
o'clock.  That  gave  us  time  for  a  bath  and  lunch  our- 
selves. As  our  bags  were  now  well  beyond  the  tenta- 
cles of  the  Customs,  we  did  a  little  figuring  on  the 
table-cloth  between  courses.  By  this  we  proved  that, 
had  we  had  the  nerve  to  disregard  the  warnings  of 
well-meaning  friends  in  Trail  and  filled  our  hand- 
bags with  Scotch  instead  of  personal  effects,  Arm- 
strong would  now  have  had  fourteen  quarts  up  in  his 
room,  and  I  eighteen  quarts.  Then  the  waitress  gave 
us  current  local  quotations,  and  we  started  to  figure 
values.  I  shall  never  know  whether  or  not  there  would 
have  been  room  on  the  corner  of  that  gravy  and  egg 
broidered  napery  for  my  stupendous  total.  Just  as 
I  was  beginning  to  run  over  the  edge,  the  Inspector 
came  in  and  asked  if  we  would  mind  letting  him  see 
those  two  suit-cases  we  had  brought  to  the  hotel  with 
us !  Many  and  various  are  the  joys  of  virtue,  but  none 
of  the  others  comparable  to  that  one  which  sets  you 
aglow  as  you  say  "Search  me!"  when,  by  the  special 
intervention  of  the  providence  which  watches  over 
fools  and  drunks,  you  haven't  got  goods. 

The  inspection,  both  at  the  hotel  and  at  the  ferry, 
was  fairly  perfunctory,  though  I  did  notice  that  the 
Customs  man  assumed  a  rather  springy  step  when  he 


210  DOWN  THE  COLUINIBIA 

trod  the  light  inner  bottom  of  the  skiff.  Roos  filmed 
the  operation  as  a  part  of  the  picture,  I  acting  as 
much  as  I  could  like  I  thought  a  farmer  would  act  at 
his  first  Customs  inspection.  Roos,  complaining  that 
I  didn't  "do  it  natural,"  wanted  to  shoot  over  again. 
The  Customs  man  was  willing,  but  Armstrong  and  I, 
trudging  purposefully  off  up  the  road,  refused  to 
return.  Roos  followed  us  to  the  hotel  in  considerable 
dudgeon.  "Why  wouldn't  you  let  me  make  that  shot 
over?"  he  asked.  "It  was  an  'oil-can' — rotten!"  "Be- 
cause," I  replied  evenly,  looking  him  straight  in  the 
eye,  "I  was  afraid  the  Inspector  might  try  that  jig-a- 
jig  step  of  his  on  the  false  bottom  in  the  bow  if  we  put 
him  through  the  show  a  second  time.  I  don't  believe 
in  tempting  providence.  We  can  get  a  street-car 
conductor  and  make  that  Inspection  shot  again  in 
Portland.  This  isn't  .  .  ."  "You're  right,"  cut  in 
Roos,  with  a  dawning  grin  of  comprehension.  "I  beg 
your  pardon.  You're  a  deeper  bird  than  I  gave  you 
credit  for.    Or  perhaps  it  was  the  Captain.  .  .  ." 

A  heavy  fog  filled  the  river  gorge  from  bank  to 
bank  when  we  pui^ed  off  the  following  morning,  and 
we  had  to  nose  down  carefully  to  avoid  the  piers  of 
the  bridge  of  the  Great  Northern  branch  line  to  Ross- 
land.  A  quarter  of  a  mile  farther  down  the  river 
began  shoaling  over  gravel  bars,  and  out  of  the  mist 
ahead  came  the  rumble  of  water  tumbling  over  boul- 
ders. This  was  an  inconsiderable  riffle  called  Bishop's 
Rapid,  but  the  Captain  was  too  old  a  river  man  to 
care  to  go  into  it  without  light  to  choose  his  channel. 
A  half  hour's  wait  on  a  gravel  bar  in  midstream 
brought  a  lifting  of  the  fog,  and  we  ran  through  by 


< 

Q 

< 


o  y 


M 


K  o 

^^ 

O  M 

Z 

< 


THE  "intake"  at  THE  LITTLE  DALLKS    [  above) 
WHERE   WE  STARTED  TO  LINE  THE   LITTLE  DALLES    (beloiv) 


REVELSTOKE  TO  THE  SPOKANE     211 

the  right  hand  of  the  two  shallow  channels  without 
difficulty.  In  brilliant  sunshine  we  pulled  down  a 
broad  stretch  of  deep  and  rapidly  slackening  water  to 
the  gleaming  white  lime-stone  barrier  at  the  head  of 
the  Little  Dalles. 

All  of  Northport  had  been  a  unit  in  warning  us  not 
to  attempt  to  run  the  Little  Dalles.  Nearly  every 
one,  as  far  as  I  could  judge,  had  lost  some  relative 
there,  and  one  man  gave  a  very  circumstantial  de- 
scription of  how  he  had  seen  a  big  hatteau,  with  six 
Swede  lumbermen,  sucked  out  of  sight  there,  never 
to  reappear.  On  cross-questioning,  he  admitted  that 
this  was  at  high  water,  and  that  there  was  nothing 
like  so  much  "suck"  in  the  whirlpools  at  the  present 
stage.  The  Captain,  however,  having  just  received 
telephonic  word  from  Nelson  that  "moderation"  had 
carried  in  B.  C.  by  a  decisive  majority,  felt  that  noth- 
ing short  of  running  the  Little  Dalles  would  be  ade- 
quate celebration.  He  had  managed  to  come  through 
right-side-up  in  a  Peterboro  once,  and  he  thought  our 
skiff  ought  to  be  equal  to  the  stunt.  He  held  that 
opinion  just  long  enough  for  him  to  climb  to  the  top 
of  the  cliff  that  forms  the  left  wall  of  river  at  the 
gorge  and  take  one  good,  long,  comprehensive  look 
into  the  depths. 

"Nothing  doing,"  he  said,  with  a  decisive  shake  of 
his  broad-brimmed  Stetson.  "The  river's  four  or  five 
feet  higher  than  when  we  ran  through  here  in  'fifteen, 
and  that  makes  all  the  difference.  It  was  touch-and- 
go  for  a  minute  then,  and  now  it's  out  of  the  question 
for  a  small  boat.  If  we  can't  line,  we'll  have  to  find 
some  way  to  portage.'* 


212  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

The  Little  Dalles  are  formed  by  a  great  reef  of 
limestone  which,  at  one  time,  probably  made  a  dam  all 
the  way  across  the  river.  The  narrow  channel  which 
the  Columbia  has  worn  through  the  stone  is  less  than 
two  hundred  feet  in  width  for  a  considerable  distance, 
and  has  lofty  perpendicular  walls.  The  river  is  di- 
vided by  a  small  rock  island  into  two  channels  at  the 
head,  the  main  one,  to  the  right,  being  about  two  hun- 
dred feet  in  width,  and  the  narrow  left-hand  one  not 
over  forty  feet.  The  depth  of  the  main  channel  is 
very  great — probably  much  greater  than  its  narrowest 
width;  so  that  here,  as  also  at  Tumwater  and  "Five- 
Mile"  in  the  Great  Dalles,  it  may  be  truly  said  that 
the  Columbia  "has  to  turn  on  its  side  to  wTiggle 
through." 

It  is  that  little  rock  island  at  the  head  of  the  gorge, 
extending,  as  it  does,  almost  longitudinally  across  the 
current  that  makes  all  the  trouble.  It  starts  one  set 
of  whirlpools  running  down  the  right-hand  channel 
and  another  set  down  the  left-hand.  Every  one  of 
the  vortices  in  this  dual  series  of  spinning  "suckers" 
is  more  than  one  would  care  to  take  any  liberties 
with  if  it  could  be  avoided;  and  either  line  of  whirl- 
pools, taken  alone,  probably  could  be  avoided.  The 
impassable  barrage  comes  a  hundred  feet  below  the 
point  where  the  left-hand  torrent  precipitates  itself 
at  right-angles  into  the  current  of  the  right-hand  one, 
and  the  two  lines  of  whirlpools  converge  in  a  "V"  and 
form  one  big  walloping  sockdolager.  Him  there 
would  still  be  room  to  run  by  if  he  were  "whouf-ing" 
there  alone;  but  his  satellites  won't  have  it.  Their 
accursed  team-work  is  such  that  the  spreading  "V" 


REVELSTOKE  TO  THE  SPOKANE     213 

above  catches  everything  that  comes  down  stream 
and  feeds  it  into  the  maw  of  the  big  whirlpool  as  into 
a  hopper.  Logs,  ties,  shingle-bolts,  fence-posts — all 
the  refuse  of  sawmills  and  the  flotsam  and  jetsam  of 
farms  and  towns — are  gulped  with  a  "whouf!"  and 
when  they  reappear  again,  a  mile  or  two  down  river, 
they  are  all  scoured  smooth  and  round-cornered  by 
their  passage  through  the  monster's  alimentary  canal. 

"I'm  sorry  not  to  celebrate  the  victory  of  'modera- 
tion,' "  said  the  Captain  finally,  with  another  regret- 
ful shake  of  his  head;  "but  'moderation'  begins  at 
home.  It  would  be  immoderately  foolish  to  put  the 
skiff  into  that  line  of  whirlpools,  the  way  they're  run- 
ning now."  Roos  was  the  only  one  who  was  inclined 
to  dispute  that  decision,  and  as  his  part  would  have 
been  to  stand  out  on  the  brink  of  the  cliff  and  turn  the 
crank,  it  was  only  natural  that  he  should  take  the 
"artistic"  rather  than  the  "humanitarian"  view. 

As  a  last  resort  before  portaging,  we  tried  lining 
down,  starting  at  the  head  of  the  narrow  left-hand 
channel.  We  gave  it  up  at  the  end  of  a  hundred 
feet.  A  monkey  at  one  end  of  the  line  and  a  log  of 
wood  at  the  other  would  have  made  the  only  combina- 
tion calculated  to  get  by  that  way.  It  was  no  job 
for  a  shaky-kneed  man  and  a  sinkable  boat.  There 
was  nothing  to  do  but  look  up  a  team  or  truck.  What 
appeared  to  be  the  remains  of  the  ancient  portage 
road  ran  down  from  an  abandoned  farm  to  the  river, 
and  it  seemed  likely  some  kind  of  vehicle  could  be 
brought  over  it. 

As  the  highway  ran  along  the  bench,  four  or  five 
hundred  feet  above  the  river,  I  set  off  by  the  railroad 


214  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

track,  which  was  comparatively  close  at  hand.  At  the 
end  of  a  couple  of  miles  I  reached  a  small  station 
called  Marhle,  the  shipping  point  for  a  large  apple 
orchard  project  financed  by  the  J.  G.  White  Com- 
I^any  of  New  York.  ]\Ir.  Reed,  the  resident  manager, 
immediately  ordered  a  powerful  team  and  wagon 
placed  at  my  disposal,  and  with  that  I  returned  north- 
ward over  the  highway.  We  had  a  rough  time  get- 
ting down  through  brush  and  deadfalls  to  the  river, 
but  finally  made  it  without  an  upset.  Roos  having 
finished  what  pictures  he  wanted — including  one  of 
the  Captain  standing  on  the  brink  of  the  cliff  and  reg- 
istering "surprise-cum-disappointment-cum-disgust," 
— we  loaded  the  skiff  and  our  outfit  onto  the  wagon 
and  stai'ted  the  long  climb  up  to  the  top  of  the  bench. 
The  discovery  of  an  overgrown  but  still  passable  road 
offered  a  better  route  than  that  followed  in  coming 
down,  and  we  made  the  highway,  and  on  to  the  vil- 
lage, in  good  time.  Mr.  Reed  dangled  the  bait  of  a 
French  chef  and  rooms  in  the  company's  hotel  as  an 
inducement  to  spend  the  night  with  him,  but  we  had 
not  the  time  to  accept  the  kind  invitation.  His  ready 
courtesy  was  of  the  kind  which  I  learned  later  I 
could  expect  as  a  matter  of  course  all  along  the  river. 
Never  did  I  have  trouble  in  getting  help  when  I 
needed  it,  and  when  it  was  charged  for,  it  was  almost 
invariably  an  under  rather  than  an  over-charge.  The 
running  road  is  the  one  place  left  where  the  people 
have  not  been  spoiled  as  have  those  on  the  highways 
frequented  by  motor  tourists. 

Launching  the  boat  from  the  Marble  Ferry  at  four 
o'clock,  we  pulled  off  in  a  good  current  in  the  hope 


REVELSTOKE  TO  THE  SPOKANE    215 

of  reaching  Bossburg  before  dark.  Between  the 
windings  of  the  river  and  several  considerable 
stretches  of  slack  water,  however,  our  progress  was 
less  than  anticipated.  Shut  in  by  high  hills  on  both 
sides,  night  descended  early  upon  the  river,  and  at 
five-thirty  I  found  myself  pulling  in  Stygian  black- 
ness. Knowing  there  was  no  really  bad  water  ahead, 
the  Captain  let  her  slide  through  a  couple  of  easy 
riffles,  the  white-topped  waves  barely  guessed  as  they 
flagged  us  with  ghostly  signals.  But  a  deepening 
growl,  borne  on  the  wings  of  the  slight  up-river  night- 
breeze,  demanded  more  consideration.  No  one  but  a 
lunatic  goes  into  a  strange  rapid  in  a  poor  light,  to 
say  nothing  of  complete  darkness.  Pulling  into  an 
eddy  by  the  left  bank,  we  stopped  and  listened.  The 
roar,  though  distant,  was  unmistakable.  Water  was 
tumbling  among  rocks  at  a  fairly  good  rate,  certainly 
too  fast  to  warrant  going  into  it  in  the  dark. 

While  we  were  debating  what  to  do,  a  black  figure 
silhouetted  itself  against  the  star-gleams  at  the  top 
of  the  low  bank.  "Hello,  there!"  hailed  the  Captain. 
"Can  you  tell  us  how  far  it  is  to  Bossburg?"  "Tins 
is  Bossburg,"  was  the  surprising  but  gratifying  re- 
sponse. "You're  there — that  is,  you're  here."  It 
proved  to  be  the  local  ferryman,  and  Columbia  ferry- 
men are  always  obliging  and  always  intelligent,  at 
least  in  matters  relating  to  the  river.  Tying  up  the 
boat,  we  left  our  stuff  in  his  nearby  house  and  sought 
the  hotel  with  our  hand-bags.  It  was  not  a  promising 
looking  hotel  when  we  found  it,  for  Bossburg  was  that 
saddest  of  living  things,  an  all-but-extinguished 
boom-town ;  but  the  very  kindly  old  couple  who  lived 


21G  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

there  and  catered  to  the  occasional  wayfarer  bustled 
about  and  got  us  a  corking  good  meal — fried  chicken 
and  biscuits  as  light  as  the  whipped  cream  we  had  on 
the  candied  peaches — and  our  beds  were  clean  and 
comfortable. 

As  we  were  now  but  a  few  miles  above  Kettle  Falls, 
the  most  complete  obstruction  in  the  whole  length  of 
the  Columbia,  I  took  the  occasion  to  telephone  ahead 
for  a  truck  with  which  to  make  the  very  considerable 
portage.  There  would  be  two  or  three  miles  at  the 
falls  in  any  case,  Captain  Armstrong  said,  and  he  was 
also  inclined  to  think  it  would  be  advisable  to  extend 
the  portage  to  the  foot  of  Grand  Rapids,  and  thus 
save  a  daj'^'s  hard  lining.  It  was  arranged  that  the 
truck  should  meet  us  at  the  ruins  of  the  old  Hudson 
Bay  post,  on  the  east  bank  some  distance  above  the 
upper  fall. 

We  pushed  off  from  Bossburg  at  eight  o'clock  on 
the  morning  of  October  twenty-third.  The  water  was 
slack  for  several  hundred  yards,  which  was  found  to 
be  due  to  a  reef  extending  all  of  the  way  across  the 
river  and  forming  the  rapid  which  we  had  heard 
growling  in  the  dark.  This  was  called  "Six  Mile,"  and 
while  it  would  have  been  an  uncomfortable  place  to 
tangle  uj)  with  in  the  night,  it  was  simple  running 
with  the  light  of  day.  "Five  Mile,"  a  bit  farther 
down,  was  studded  with  big  black  rocks,  but  none  of 
them  hard  to  avoid.  As  we  were  running  rather 
ahead  of  the  time  of  our  rendezvous  with  the  truck, 
we  stretched  our  legs  the  length  and  back  of  the  main 
street  of  Marcus,  a  growing  little  town  which  is  the 
junction  point  for  the  Boundary  Branch  of  the  Great 


REVELSTOKE  TO  THE  SPOKANE     217 

Northern.  We  passed  the  mouth  of  the  Kettle  River 
shortly  after  runnmg  under  the  railway  bridge,  and  a 
pull  across  a  big  eddy  carried  us  to  the  lake-like 
stretch  of  water  backed  up  by  the  rocky  obstructions 
responsible  for  Kettle  Falls.  The  roar  of  the  latter 
filled  the  air  as  we  headed  into  a  shallow,  mud-bot- 
tomed lagoon  widening  riverward  from  the  mouth 
of  a  small  creek  and  beached  the  skiff  under  a  yellow- 
ing fringe  of  willows.  The  site  of  the  historic  post 
was  in  an  extremely  aged  apple  orchard  immediately 
above.  It  was  one  of  those  "inevitable"  spots,  where 
the  voyagetirs  of  all  time  passing  up  or  down  the  river 
must  have  begun  or  ended  their  portages.  I  was  try- 
ing to  conjure  up  pictures  of  a  few  of  these  in  my 
mind,  when  the  chug-chugging  of  an  engine  some- 
where among  the  pines  of  the  distant  hillside  recalled 
me  to  a  realization  of  the  fact  that  it  was  time  to  get 
ready  for  my  own  portage.  Before  we  had  our  stuff 
out  of  the  boat  the  truck  had  come  to  a  throbbing 
standstill  beyond  the  fringe  of  the  willows.  It  prom- 
ised to  be  an  easier  portage  than  some  of  our  predeces- 
sors had  had,  in  any  event. 

To  maintain  his  "continuity,"  Roos  filmed  the  skifl^ 
being  taken  out  of  the  water  and  loaded  upon  the 
truck,  the  truck  passing  down  the  main  street  of  the 
town  of  Kettle  Falls,  and  a  final  launching  in  the 
river  seven  miles  below.  Half  way  into  town  we 
passed  an  old  Indian  mission  that  must  have  been 
about  contemporaneous  with  Hudson  Bay  operations. 
Although  no  nails  had  been  used  in  its  construction, 
the  ancient  building,  with  its  high-pitched  roof,  still 
survived  in  a  comparatively  good  state  of  preserva- 


218  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

tion.  The  town  is  some  little  distance  below  the  Falls, 
and  quite  out  of  sight  of  the  river,  which  flows  here 
between  very  high  banks.  We  stopped  at  the  hotel 
for  lunch  before  completing  the  portage. 

After  talking  the  situation  over  with  Captain  Arm- 
strong, I  decided  to  fall  in  with  his  suggestion  to  pass 
Grand  Rapids  as  well  as  Kettle  Falls  in  the  portage. 
There  were  only  about  five  miles  of  boatable  water 
between  the  foot  of  the  latter  and  the  head  of  the 
former,  and  then  an  arduous  three-quarters  of  a  mile 
of  lining  that  would  have  entailed  the  loss  of  another 
day.  There  is  a  drop  of  twelve  feet  in  about  twelve 
hundred  yards  in  Grand  Rapids,  with  nothing  ap- 
proaching a  clear  channel  among  the  huge  black  ba- 
saltic rocks  that  have  been  scattered  about  through 
them  as  from  a  big  pepper  shaker.  As  far  as  I  could 
learn,  there  is  no  record  of  any  kind  of  a  man-pro- 
pelled craft  of  whatever  size  ever  having  run  through 
and  survived,  but  a  small  stern-wheeler,  the  Sho- 
shone, was  run  down  several  years  ago  at  high  water. 
She  reached  the  foot  a  good  deal  of  a  hulk,  but  still 
right  side  up.  This  is  rated  as  one  of  the  maddest 
things  ever  done  with  a  steamer  on  the  Columbia,  and 
the  fact  that  it  did  not  end  in  complete  disaster  is 
reckoned  by  old  river  men  as  having  been  due  in  about 
equal  parts  to  the  inflexible  nerve  of  her  skipper  and 
the  intervention  of  the  special  providence  that  makes 
a  point  of  watching  over  mortals  who  do  things  like 
that.  I  met  Captain  McDermid  a  fortnight  later  in 
Potaris.  He  told  me  then,  what  I  hadn't  heard  be- 
fore, that  he  took  his  wife  and  children  with  him. 
"Nellie  thought  a  lot  of  both  me  and  the  little  old 


REVELSTOKE  TO  THE  SPOKANE    219 

Shoshone"  he  said  with  a  wistful  smile,  "and  she 
reckoned  that,  if  we  went,  she  wouldn't  exactly  like 
to  be  left  here  alone.  And  so — I  never  could  refuse 
Nellie  anything — I  took  her  along.  And  now  she 
and  the  Shoshone  are  both  gone."  He  was  a  won- 
derful chap — McDermid.  All  old  Columbia  River 
skippers  are.  They  wouldn't  have  survived  if  they 
hadn't  been. 

There  was  a  low  bench  on  the  left  bank,  about  a 
mile  below  the  foot  of  Grand  Rapids,  which  could  be 
reached  by  a  rough  road,  and  from  which  the  boat 
could  be  slid  down  over  the  rocks  to  the  river.  Run- 
ning to  this  point  with  the  truck,  we  left  our  heavier 
outfit  at  a  road  camp  and  dropped  the  boat  at  the 
water's  edge,  ready  for  launching  the  following 
morning.  Returning  to  the  town,  we  were  driven 
up  to  the  Falls  by  Dr.  Baldwin,  a  prominent 
member  of  this  live  and  attractive  little  commu- 
nity, where  Roos  made  a  number  of  shots.  The  upper 
or  main  fall  has  a  vertical  drop  of  fifteen  feet  at  low 
water,  while  the  lower  fall  is  really  a  rough  tumbling 
cascade  with  a  drop  of  ten  feet  in  a  quarter  of  a  mile. 
The  river  is  divided  at  the  head  of  the  Falls  by  an 
arrow-shaped  rock  island,  the  main  channel  being  the 
one  to  the  right.  The  left-hand  channel  loops  in  a 
broad  "V"  around  the  island  and,  running  between 
precipitous  walls,  accomplishes  in  a  beautiful  rapid  the 
same  drop  that  the  main  channel  does  by  the  upper 
fall.  A  rocky  peninsula,  extending  squarely  across 
the  course  of  the  left-hand  channel,  forces  the  rolling 
current  of  the  latter  practically  to  turn  a  somersault 
before  accepting  the  dictum  that  it  must  double  back 


220  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

northward  for  five  or  six  hundred  feet  before  uniting 
with  the  main  river.  It  was  the  savage  swirling  of 
water  in  that  rock-walled  elbow  where  the  "somer- 
sault" takes  place  that  prompted  the  imaginative 
French-Canadian  voyagciirs  to  apply  the  appropri- 
ately descriptive  name  of  Chaudicre  to  the  boiling 
maelstrom. 

Up  to  the  present  the  development  of  the  enormous 
power  running  to  waste  over  Kettle  Falls  has  gone  lit- 
tle further  than  the  dreams  of  the  brave  community 
of  optimists  who  have  been  attracted  there  in  the 
belief  that  a  material  asset  of  such  incalculable  value 
cannot  always  be  ignored  in  a  growing  country  like 
our  own.  And  they  are  right,  of  course,  but  a  few 
years  ahead  of  time.  It  is  only  the  children  and 
grandchildren  of  the  living  pioneers  of  the  Columbia 
who  will  see  more  than  the  beginning  of  its  untold 
millions  of  horse-power  broken  to  harness.  And  in 
the  meantime  the  optimists  of  Kettle  Falls  are  turning 
their  attention  to  agriculture  and  horticulture.  Never 
have  I  seen  finer  apple  orchards  than  those  through 
which  we  drove  on  the  way  to  resume  our  down-river 
voyage. 

The  point  from  which  we  pushed  off  at  ten  o'clock 
on  the  morning  of  October  twenty-fourth  must  have 
been  only  a  little  below  that  at  which  Lieutenant 
Symons  launched  the  hatteau  for  his  historic  voyage 
to  the  mouth  of  the  Snake  in  1881.  Forty  years  have 
gone  by  since  that  memorable  undertaking,  yet  Sy- 
mons' report  is  to-day  not  only  the  most  accurate 
description  of  an  upper  Columbia  voyage  that  has 
ever  been  written,  but  also  the  most  readable.    During 


REVELSTOKE  TO  THE  SPOKANE    221 

the  time  I  was  running  the  three  hundred  and  fifty 
miles  of  river  surveyed  by  Lieutenant  Symons,  I 
found  his  admirable  report  only  less  fascinating  on 
the  human  side  than  it  was  of  material  assistance  on 
the  practical. 

Of  his  preparations  for  the  voyage  Lieutenant 
Sj^mons  writes: 

"I  was  fortunate  enough  to  procure  from  John  Rickey, 
a  settler  and  trader,  who  lives  at  the  Grand  Rapids,  a 
strongly  built  batteau,  and  had  his  assistance  in  selecting  a 
crew  of  Indians  for  the  journey.  The  batteau  was  about 
thirty  feet  long,  four  feet  wide  at  the  gunwales,  and  two 
feet  deep,  and  is  as  small  a  boat  as  the  voyage  should  ever 
be  attempted  in,  if  it  is  contemplated  to  go  through  all  the 
rapids.  My  first  lookout  had  been  to  secure  the  services  of 
'Old  Pierre  Agare'  as  steersman,  and  I  had  to  carry  on 
negotiations  with  him  for  several  days  before  he  finally  con- 
sented to  go.  Old  Pierre  is  the  only  one  of  the  old  Hudson 
Bay  voyageurs  now  left  who  knows  the  river  thoroughly  at 
all  stages  of  water,  from  Colville  to  its  mouth.  .  .  .  The 
old  man  is  seventy  years  of  age,  and  hale  and  hearty,  al- 
though his  eyesight  is  somewhat  defective.  .  .  .  The  other 
Indians  engaged  were  Pen-waw,  Big  Pierre,  Little  Pierre,  and 
Joseph.  They  had  never  made  the  trip  all  the  way  down  the 
river,  and  their  minds  were  full  of  the  dangers  and  terrors  of 
the  great  rapids  below,  and  it  was  a  long  time  before  we  could 
prevail  upon  them  to  go,  by  promising  them  a  high  price 
and  stipulating  for  their  return  by  rail  and  stage.  Old 
Pierre  and  John  Rickey  laboured  and  talked  with  them  long 
and  faithfully,  to  gain  their  consent,  and  I  am  sure  that 
they  started  off  with  as  many  misgivings  about  getting  safely 
through  as  we  did  who  had  to  trust  our  lives  to  their  skill, 
confidence  and  obedience." 


222  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

Lieutenant  Symons  does  not  state  whether  any  con- 
fusion ever  arose  as  a  consequence  of  the  fact  that 
three  of  his  five  Indians  bore  the  inevitable  French- 
Canadian  name  of  "Pierre."  Of  the  method  of  work 
followed  by  himself  and  his  topographical  assistant, 
Downing,  throughout  the  voyage,  he  writes : 

"Mr.  Downing  and  myself  worked  independently  in  getting 
as  thorough  knowledge  of  the  river  as  possible,  he  taking  the 
courses  with  a  prismatic  compass,  and  estimating  distances 
by  the  eye,  and  sketching  in  the  topographical  features  of 
the  surrounding  country,  while  I  estimated  also  the  dis- 
tances to  marked  points,  and  paid  particular  attention  to  the 
bed  of  the  river,  sounding  wherever  there  were  any  indica- 
tions of  shallowness.  Each  evening  we  compared  notes  as 
to  distances,  and  we  found  them  to  come  out  very  well  to- 
gether, the  greatest  difference  being  six  and  three-fourths 
miles  in  a  day's  run  of  sixty-four  miles.  Some  days  they 
were  identical.  The  total  distance  from  our  starting  point 
...  to  the  mouth  of  the  Snake  River  was  estimated  by 
Mr.  Downing  to  be  three  hundred  and  sixty-three  miles,  and 
by  myself  to  be  three  hundred  and  fifty.  His  distances  were 
obtained  by  estimating  how  far  it  was  to  some  marked  point 
ahead,  and  correcting  it  when  the  point  was  reached;  mine 
by  the  time  required  to  pass  over  the  distances,  in  which  the 
elements  considered  were  the  swiftness  of  the  current  and 
the  labour  of  the  oarsmen." 

I  may  state  that  it  was  only  rarely  that  we  found 
the  distances  arrived  at  by  Lieutenant  Symons  and 
Mr.  Downing  to  be  greatly  at  variance  with  those 
established  by  later  surveys.  In  the  matter  of  bars, 
rapids,  currents,  channels  and  similar  things,  there 
appeared  to  have  been  astonishingly  little  change  in 


REVELSTOKE  TO  THE  SPOKANE    223 

the  four  decades  that  had  elapsed  since  he  had  made 
his  observations.  Where  he  advised,  for  instance, 
taking  the  right-hand  in  preference  to  the  middle  or 
left-hand  channels,  it  was  not  often  that  we  went  far 
wrong  in  heeding  the  direction.  Bars  of  gravel,  of 
course,  shift  from  season  to  season,  but  reefs  and 
projections  of  the  native  rock  are  rarely  altered  by 
more  than  a  negligible  erosion.  The  prominent  to- 
pographical features — cHffs,  headlands,  coulees, 
mountains — are  immutable,  and  for  mile  after  mile, 
bend  after  bend,  we  picked  them  up  just  as  Symons 
reported  them. 

The  river  is  broad  and  slow  for  a  few  miles  below 
Grand  Rapids  (they  are  called  Rickey's  Rapids 
locally),  with  steep-sided  benches  rising  on  either 
hand,  and  the  green  of  apple  orchards  showing  in 
bright  fringes  along  their  brinks.  There  had  been 
the  usual  warnings  in  Kettle  Falls  of  a  bad  rapid  to 
be  encountered  "somewhere  below,"  but  the  data 
available  on  this  part  of  the  river  made  us  practically 
certain  that  nothing  worse  than  minor  riffles  existed 
until  the  swift  run  of  Spokane  Rapids  was  reached. 
Seven  miles  below  Grand  Rapids  several  islands  of 
black  basalt  contracted  the  river  considerably,  but 
any  one  of  two  or  three  channels  offered  an  easy  way 
through  them.  The  highest  of  them  had  a  driftwood 
crown  that  was  not  less  than  fifty  feet  above  the  pres- 
ent stage  of  the  river,  showing  graphically  the  gi-eat 
rise  and  fall  at  this  point. 

At  the  shallow  San  Poil  bar  we  saw  some  Indians 
from  the  Colville  Reservation  fishing  for  salmon — 
the  crooked-nosed  "dogs"  of  the  final  run.    If  they 


224  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

were  of  the  tribe  from  which  the  bar  must  have  been 
named,  civilization  had  brought  them  its  blessing  in 
the  form  of  hair-restorer.  They  were  as  hirsute  a  lot 
of  ruffians  as  one  could  expect  to  find  out  of  Bol- 
shevia — and  as  dirty. 

Turtle  Rapid  was  the  worst  looking  place  we 
found  during  the  day,  but  the  menace  was  more  ap- 
parent than  real.  The  riffle  took  its  name  from  a 
number  of  turtle-backed  outcroppings  of  bedrock 
pushing  up  all  the  way  across  the  river.  The  current 
was  swift  and  deep,  making  it  just  the  sort  of  place 
one  would  have  expected  to  encounter  bad  swirls. 
These  were,  indeed,  making  a  good  deal  of  a  stir  at 
the  foot  of  several  of  the  narrow  side  runs,  but  by 
the  broader  middle  channel  which  we  followed  the 
going  was  comparatively  smooth.  We  finished  an 
easy  day  by  tying  up  at  four  o'clock  where  the  road 
to  the  Colville  Reservation  comes  down  to  the  boul- 
der-bordered bank  at  Hunter's  Ferry. 

Columbia  River  ferry-men  are  always  kindly  and 
hospitable,  and  this  one  invited  us  to  sleep  on  his 
hay  and  cook  our  meals  in  his  kitchen.  He  was  an 
amiable  "cracker"  from  Kentucky,  with  a  delectable 
drawl,  a  tired-looking  wife  and  a  houseful  of  chil- 
dren. Ferry-men's  wives  always  have  many  children. 
This  one  was  still  pretty,  though,  and  her  droop — for 
a  few  years  yet — would  be  rather  appealing  than 
otherwise.  I  couldn't  be  quite  sure — from  a  remark 
she  made — whether  she  had  a  sense  of  humor,  or 
whether  she  had  not.  Seeing  her  sitting  by  the  kitchen 
stove  with  a  baby  crooked  into  her  left  arm,  a  two- 
year-old  on  her  lap,  and  a  three-year-old  riding  her 


REVELSTOKE  TO  THE  SPOKANE    225 

foot,  the  while  she  was  trying  to  fry  eggs,  bake  bis- 
cuit and  boil  potatoes,  I  observed,  by  way  of  bring- 
ing a  brighter  atmosphere  with  my  presence,  that  it 
was  a  pity  that  the  human  race  hadn't  been  crossed 
with  octopi,  so  that  young  mothers  would  have 
enough  arms  to  do  their  work  with.  She  nodded  ap- 
provingly at  first,  brightening  visibly  at  the  eman- 
cipative vision  conjured  up  in  her  tired  brain,  but 
after  five  minutes  of  serious  cogitation  relapsed  into 
gloom.  "I  reckon  it  wouldn't  be  any  use,  mist  ah," 
she  said  finally;  "them  octupusses  would  only  give  the 
young  'uns  mo'  ahms  to  find  troubl'  with."  Now 
did  she  have  a  sense  of  humour,  or  did  she  not  ? 

We  had  a  distinctly  bad  night  of  it  hitting  the  hay. 
The  mow  was  built  with  a  horseshoe-shaped  manger 
running  round  three  sides  of  it,  into  which  the  hay 
was  supposed  to  descend  by  gravity  as  the  cows  de- 
voured what  was  below.  As  a  labour-saving  device  it 
had  a  good  deal  to  recommend  it,  but  as  a  place  to 
sleep — well,  it  might  not  have  been  so  bad  if  each  of 
the  dozen  cows  had  not  been  belled,  and  if  the  weight 
of  our  tired  bodies  on  the  hay  had  not  kept  pressing 
it  into  the  manger  all  night,  and  so  made  a  continu- 
ous performance  of  feeding  and  that  bovine  bell- 
chorus.  I  dozed  off  for  a  spell  along  toward  morn- 
ing, awakening  from  a  Chinese-gong  nightmare  to 
find  my  bed  tilted  down  at  an  angle  of  forty-five  de- 
grees and  a  rough  tongue  lapping  my  face.  With 
most  of  my  mattress  eaten  up,  I  was  all  but  in  the 
manger  myself.  Turning  out  at  daybreak,  we 
pushed  off  at  an  early  hour. 

A  run  of  nine  miles,  made  in  about  an  hour,  took 


226  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

us  to  Gerome,  where  another  ferry  crossed  to  the 
west  or  Colville  Reservation  bank.  A  couple  of 
swift,  shallow  rapids  above  and  below  Roger's  Bar 
was  the  only  rough  water  encountered.  We  were 
looking  for  a  point  from  which  Spokane  could  be 
reached  by  car,  as  Captain  Armstrong,  who  had  orig- 
inally planned  to  go  with  us  only  to  Kettle  Falls,  was 
now  quite  at  the  end  of  the  time  he  was  free  to  remain 
away  from  Nelson  and  business.  There  were  two 
reasons  for  our  making  a  temporary  halt  at  Gerome 
Ferry.  One  was  the  fact  that  Spokane  could  be 
reached  as  readily  from  there  as  from  any  point  lower 
down,  and  the  other  was  Ike  Emerson.  I  shall  have 
so  much  to  say  of  Ike  a  bit  further  along  that  I  shall 
no  more  than  introduce  him  for  the  moment. 

As  much  of  the  worst  water  on  the  American  course 
of  the  Columbia  occurs  in  the  two  hundred  and  thirty 
miles  between  the  head  of  Spokane  Rapids  and  the 
foot  of  Priest  Rapids,^  I  was  considerably  concerned 
about  finding  a  good  river  man  to  take  Captain  Arm- 
strong's place  and  help  me  with  the  boat.  Roos  made 
no  pretensions  to  river  usefulness,  and  I  was  reluctant 
to  go  into  some  of  the  rapids  that  I  knew  were  ahead 
of  us  without  a  dependable  man  to  handle  the  steer- 
ing paddle  and  to  help  with  lining.  Men  of  this  kind 
were  scarce,  it  appeared — even  more  so  than  on  the 
Big  Bend,  in  Canada,  where  there  was  a  certain 
amount  of  logging  and  trapping  going  on.  Two  or 
three    ferry-men   had    shaken   their   heads    when    I 


1  Not  be  confused  with  the  rapids  of  the  same  name  we  had  run  on 
the  Biff  Bend  in  Canada. 

L.  R.  F. 


REVELSTOKE  TO  THE  SPOKANE     227 

brought  the  matter  up.  There  was  nothing  they 
would  like  better  if  they  were  free,  they  said,  but, 
as  ferries  couldn't  be  expected  to  run  by  themselves, 
that  was  out  of  the  question  on  such  short  notice. 

It  was  that  genial  "cracker"  at  Hunter's  Ferry 
who  was  the  first  to  mention  Ike  Emerson.  Ike 
would  be  just  my  man,  he  said,  with  that  unmistaka- 
ble grin  that  a  man  grins  when  the  person  he  speaks 
of  is  some  kind  of  a  "character."  Or,  leastways,  Ike 
would  be  just  my  man — if  I  could  find  him.  "And 
where  shall  I  be  likely  to  find  him?"  I  asked.  He 
wasn't  quite  sure  about  that,  but  probably  "daun 
rivah  sumwhah."  There  was  no  telling  about  Ike,  it 
appeared.  Once  he  had  been  seen  to  sink  when  his 
raft  had  gone  to  pieces  in  Hell  Gate,  and  he  had  been 
mourned  as  dead  for  a  fortnight.  At  the  end  of  that 
time  he  had  turned  up  in  Kettle  Falls,  but  quite  un- 
able— or  else  unwilling — to  tell  why  the  river  had 
carried  him  eighty-five  miles  up  stream  instead  of 
down  to  the  Pacific.  A  keg  of  moonshine  which  had 
been  Ike's  fellow  passenger  on  the  ill-fated  raft  may 
have  had  something  to  do  both  with  the  wreck  and 
that  long  up-stream  swim  after  the  wreck.  At  any 
rate,  it  had  never  been  explained.  However,  Gerome 
was  Ike's  headquarters — if  any  place  might  be  called 
that  for  a  man  who  lived  on  or  in  the  river  most  of  the 
time — and  that  would  be  the  place  to  inquire  for  him. 

When  I  asked  the  ferry-man  at  Gerome  if  Ike 
Emerson  had  been  seen  thereabouts  recently,  he 
grinned  the  same  sort  of  grin  his  colleague  at  Hun- 
ter's had  grinned  when  the  same  subject  was  under 
discussion.    Yes,  he  had  seen  Ike  only  the  night  be- 


228  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

fore.  He  was  a  real  old  river  rat;  just  the  man  I 
wanted — //  /  could  find  Jiim,  He  was  as  hard  as  a 
flea  to  put  your  hand  on  when  you  did  want  him, 
though.  Well,  it  took  us  four  hours  to  run  our  man 
down,  but  luck  was  with  us  in  the  end.  Every  lum- 
berjack, farmer  and  Indian  that  we  asked  about  Ike, 
grinned  that  same  grin,  dropped  whatever  he  was 
doing  and  joined  in  the  search.  There  were  a  score  of 
us  when  the  "View  Halloo"  was  finally  sounded,  and 
we  looked  more  like  a  lynching  party  on  vengeance 
bent  than  anything  else  I  can  think  of.  Ike,  who  was 
digging  potatoes  (of  all  the  things  in  the  world  for  a 
river  rat  to  be  doing),  glowered  suspiciously  as  we 
debouched  from  a  coulee  and  streamed  down  toward 
him,  but  his  brow  cleared  instantly  when  I  hastily 
told  him  what  we  had  come  for. 

You  bet,  he  would  go  with  us.  But,  wait  a  mo- 
ment! Why  should  we  not  go  with  him?  He  was 
overdue  with  a  raft  of  logs  and  cordwood  he  had  con- 
tracted to  take  down  below  Hell  Gate,  and  was  just 
about  to  get  to  work  building  it.  We  could  just 
throw  our  boat  aboard,  and  off  we  would  go  together. 
If  he  could  get  enough  help,  he  could  have  the  raft 
ready  in  two  or  three  days,  and,  once  started,  it  would 
not  be  a  lot  slower  than  the  skiff,  especially  if  we  took 
a  fast  motor-boat  he  knew  of  for  towing  purposes 
and  to  "put  her  into  the  rapids  right."  It  would  make 
a  lot  more  of  a  show  for  the  movies,  and  he  had  always 
dreamed  of  having  himself  filmed  on  a  big  raft  run- 
ning Hell  Gate  and  Box  Canyon.  Just  let  us  leave 
it  to  him,  and  he  would  turn  out  something  that  would 
be  the  real  thing. 


REVELSTOKE  TO  THE  SPOKANE    229 

All  of  this  sounded  distinctly  good  to  me,  but  I 
turned  to  Roos  and  Captain  Armstrong  for  confirma- 
tion before  venturing  a  decision.  Roos  said  it  would 
be  "the  cat's  ears"  (late  slang  meaning  au  fait,  or 
something  like  that,  in  English)  ;  that  a  raft  would 
photograph  Hke  a  million  dollars.  Armstrong's  face 
was  beaming.  "It  will  be  the  chance  of  a  lifetime," 
he  said  warmly.  "Go  by  all  means.  I'm  only  sorry 
I  can't  be  with  you."  So  we  gave  Ike  carte  blanche 
and  told  him  to  go  ahead ;  we  would  arrange  the  finan- 
cial end  when  he  knew  more  about  what  he  would  be 
spending.  I  was  glad  of  the  wait  for  one  reason;  it 
would  give  us  a  chance  to  speed  the  Captain  on  his 
way  as  far  as  Spokane. 

Running  over  a  Spokane  paper  in  the  post  office 
and  general  store  at  Gerome,  the  program  of  the 
Chamber  of  Commerce  luncheon  for  the  morrow,  Oc- 
tober the  twenty-sixth,  recalled  to  me  that  I  had  a 
conditional  engagement  to  perform  at  that  function. 
Major  Laird,  the  Publicity  Secretary  of  the  Cham- 
ber, had  phoned  me  before  we  left  Nelson,  asking  if 
I  would  run  up  to  Spokane  from  some  convenient 
point  on  the  river  and  give  them  a  bit  of  a  yarn  about 
our  voyage  at  the  next  Tuesday  luncheon.  I  had 
replied  that,  as  it  was  quite  out  of  the  question  keep- 
ing to  any  definite  schedule  in  river  travel,  I  could 
give  him  no  positive  assurance  of  turning  up  in  time, 
but  suggested  that  if  he  would  sign  up  some  one  else 
for  piece  de  resistance,  he  could  be  free  to  use  me  for 
soup  or  nuts  in  the  event  I  put  in  an  appearance.  As 
it  now  appeared  that  we  had  arrived  within  a  few 
hours  of  Spokane,  I  phoned  Major  Laird,  and  he 


230  DOWN  THE  COLU^NIBIA 

said  he  would  start  a  car  off  at  once  to  take  us  there. 

We  spent  the  afternoon  helping  Roos  patch  up  the 
continuity  of  his  "farmer"  picture.  Although  Cap- 
tain Armstrong  had  appeared  in  all  the  scenes  shot 
since  we  started  with  the  skiff,  he  had  never  made  his 
official  entry  into  the  picture.  Properly,  this  should 
have  been  done  in  one  of  the  introductory  scenes  shot 
at  the  source  of  the  river,  near  Lake  Windermere.  It 
will  be  remembered  that,  when  I  leaned  on  my  hay- 
fork and  gazed  pensively  off  toward  the  river,  I  was 
suj^posed  to  see  a  prospector  tinkering  with  his  boat. 
I  had  walked  out  of  two  scenes  on  my  way  to 
join  that  prospector:  the  first  time  to  ask  if 
he  would  take  me  with  him,  and  the  second  time,  with 
a  blanket-roll  on  my  shoulder  (the  improvised  one 
with  the  two  "nicht-goons"  and  other  foreign  knick- 
knacks  in  it),  to  jump  into  the  boat  and  push  off. 
Obviously,  as  we  had  neither  prospector  nor  boat  at 
the  time,  these  shots  could  not  be  made  until  later. 
Now,  with  the  "prospector"  about  to  leave  us,  it  was 
imperative  to  continuity  that  we  should  get  him  into 
the  picture  before  we  could  go  ahead  getting  him  out 
of  it. 

"Location"  was  our  first  care,  and  in  this  fortune 
favoured  us.  The  mouth  of  a  small  creek  flowing  in 
just  below  Gerome  furnished  a  "source  of  the  Colum- 
bia" background  that  would  have  defied  an  expert  to 
tell  from  an  original.  In  fact,  it  looked  more  like  the 
popular  idea  of  a  "source"  than  did  the  real  one;  and 
that  is  an  important  point  with  the  movies.  Here  we 
made  the  "tinkering"  and  the  "first  push-off"  shots. 
Of  course,  I  had  a  different  blanket-roll  on  my  shoul- 


REVELSTOKE  TO  THE  SPOKANE    231 

der  this  time,  but  I  took  great  care  to  make  it  as  close 
an  imitation  as  possible  of  the  one  I  had  so  hastily 
flung  together  out  of  "Jock's"  bedding.  A  close  imi- 
tation externally,  I  mean — there  were  no  "frou- 
frous" in  it. 

Now  that  we  had  the  "prospector"  properly  into 
the  picture,  we  were  ready  for  the  "farewell"  shot — 
the  getting  him  out  of  it.  For  this  the  Captain  and  I 
were  "picked  up"  on  a  picturesque  rocky  point,  re- 
garding with  interest  something  far  off  down-river. 
Presently  he  registers  "dawning  comprehension,"  and 
tells  me  in  fluent  French-Canadian  pantomime  that  it 
is  a  raft — a  whale  of  a  big  one.  That  will  offer  a  way 
for  me  to  continue  my  voyage  now  that  he  has  to  leave 
me.  Then  we  go  down  to  the  boat,  which  he  presents 
to  me  with  a  comprehensive  "it-is-all-yours"  gesture, 
before  shouldering  his  sack  of  ore  (one  of  our  bags  of 
canned  stuff  answered  very  well  for  this)  and  climbing 
off  up  the  bank  toward  the  "smelter."  (We  had  in- 
tended to  make  a  real  smelter  scene  at  Trail  or  North- 
port,  but  the  light  was  poor  at  both  places.)  Finally 
I  pushed  off  alone,  pulling  down  and  across  the  cur- 
rent to  throw  in  my  fortunes  with  the  "raft."  That 
left  the  thread  of  "continuity"  dangling  free,  to  be 
spliced  up  as  soon  as  Ike  had  the  raft  completed. 
That  worthy  was  losing  no  time.  All  afternoon  we 
heard  the  rumble  of  logs  rolling  over  boulders,  and 
every  now  and  then  a  fan-shaped  splash  of  spray 
would  flash  up  with  a  spangle  of  iridescence  in  the  light 
of  the  declining  sun. 

The  car  arrived  for  us  at  seven-thirty  that  evening. 
It  was  driven  by  Commissioner  Howard,  of  the  Spo- 


232  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

kane  County  Board,  who  had  courteously  volunteered 
to  come  for  us  when  it  appeared  there  would  be  some 
delay  in  getting  a  hired  car  off  for  the  hundred  and 
sixty-mile  round  trip.  He  was  accompanied  by  his 
son,  a  high-school  youngster.  As  they  had  eaten 
lunch  on  the  way,  they  announced  themselves  ready 
to  start  on  the  return  trip  at  once.  The  road  turned 
out  to  be  a  rough  mountain  track,  and  rather  muddy. 
Ten  miles  out  from  Gerome  a  suspicious  clicking  set 
in  somewhere  under  the  rear  seat,  and  at  twenty  miles 
the  differential  had  gone.  Mr.  Howard  finally  in- 
duced an  empty  truck  to  take  us  in  tow,  and  behind 
that  lumbering  vehicle  we  did  the  last  sixty  miles. 
The  tow-chain  parted  on  an  average  of  once  a  mile 
while  we  were  still  in  the  mountains,  but  did  better 
as  the  roads  improved.  The  temperature  fell  as  the 
altitude  increased,  and  it  must  have  been  well  un- 
der twenty  before  daylight — and  a  mean,  marrow- 
searching  cold  at  that.  Mr.  Howard,  refusing  every 
offer  of  relief,  stuck  it  out  at  the  wheel  all  the  way  in 
— a  remarkable  example  of  nerve  and  endurance, 
considering  that  he  had  only  recently  come  out  of  a 
hospital.  Armstrong,  as  always,  was  indomitable, 
singing  French-Canadian  boating  songs  of  blood- 
stirring  tempo  most  of  the  way.  I  shall  ever  asso- 
ciate his 

^^Rouli,  roulant,  ma  houJe  roulant. 
En  roulant,  ma  boule  roulant!" 

rather  with  the  chug-chugging  of  a  motor  truck  than 
with  the  creak  of  oars  from  which  it  derived  its  inspi- 
ration. 


REVELSTOKE  TO  THE  SPOKANE    233 

We  struck  the  paved  state  highway  at  Davenport 
about  four  o'clock,  and  in  the  very  grey  dawn  of 
the  morning  after  came  rumbhng  into  Spokane. 
Somewhere  in  the  dim  shadowy  outskirts  we  stopped 
rumbling.  The  truck  driver  reported  he  had  run  out 
of  gas.  Assiduous  milking  of  the  Cole's  tank  yielded 
just  enough  to  carry  us  on  to  the  hotel.  The  Daven- 
port of  Spokane  is  one  of  the  very  finest  hotels  in  all 
the  world,  but  if  it  had  been  just  a  cabin  with  a  stove, 
it  would  still  have  seemed  a  rose-sweet  paradise  after 
those  last  two  nights  we  had  put  in — one  on  the  hay 
with  belled  cows  eating  up  the  beds  beneath  our  backs, 
and  the  other  jerked  over  a  frosty  road  in  the  wake  of 
a  skidding  truck.  Soaking  for  an  hour  in  a  steaming 
bath,  I  rolled  in  between  soft  sheets,  leaving  orders 
not  to  be  called  until  noon. 

Spokane  is  one  of  the  finest,  cleanest  and  most  beau- 
tiful cities  of  the  West,  and  I  have  never  left  it  after 
a  visit  without  regret.  This  time,  brief  as  our  stay 
had  to  be,  was  no  exception.  It  was  an  unusually 
keen  looking  lot  of  business  and  professional  men  that 
turned  out  for  the  Chamber  luncheon,  among  whom  I 
found  not  a  few  old  college  friends  and  others  I  had 
not  seen  for  a  number  of  years.  Notable  of  these 
were  Herbert  INIoore  and  Samuel  Stern,  with  whom 
I  had  spent  six  weeks  on  a  commercial  mission  in 
China  in  1910.  I  was  also  greatly  interested  to  meet 
Mr.  Turner,  the  field  engineer  of  the  great  project 
for  reclaiming  a  million  and  three-quarters  acres  of 
land  in  the  Columbia  Basin  of  eastern  Washington 
by  diverting  to  it  water  from  the  Pend  d'Oreille. 
The  incalculable  possibilities,  as  well  as  the  great  need 


234  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

of  this  daring  project  I  was  to  see  much  of  at  first- 
hand during  that  part  of  my  voyage  on  which  I  was 
about  to  embark. 

Captain  Armstrong  left  by  train  for  Nelson  the 
evening  of  the  27th,  and  the  following  morning  Major 
Laird  drove  Roos  and  me  back  to  Gerome.  For  a 
considerable  part  of  the  distance  we  followed  the 
highly  picturesque  route  along  the  Spokane  River, 
stopping  for  lunch  at  the  hydro-electric  plant  of  the 
Washington  Power  Company  at  Long  Lake.  This 
enterprising  corporation  has  power  installations 
already  in  operation  on  the  Spokane  which  must  make 
that  stream  pretty  nearly  the  most  completely  har- 
nessed river  of  its  size  in  America.  The  lofty  concrete 
barrier  which  backs  up  Long  Lake  has  the  distinc- 
tion of  being  the  highest  spillway  dam  in  the  world. 
The  "Spokane  interval"  proved  a  highly  enjoyable 
spell  of  relaxation  before  tackling  the  rough  stretch 
of  river  ahead.  I  knew  I  was  going  to  miss  greatly 
the  guiding  hand  and  mind  of  Captain  Armstrong, 
but  had  higli  hopes  of  Ike  Emerson.  I  was  not  to  be 
disappointed. 


CHAPTER  X 

RAFTING    THROUGH    HELL    GATE 

Ike  had  been  working  at  high  speed  during  our 
absence,  but  his  imagination  appeared  rather  to  have 
run  ahead  of  his  powers  of  execution.  The  hundred- 
feet-long,  thirty-feet-wide  raft  he  had  set  himself  to 
construct  (so  as  to  have  something  that  would  "stack 
up  big  in  the  movie" )  took  another  two  days  to  com- 
plete, and  even  then  was  not  quite  all  that  critical 
artist  wanted  to  make  it.  After  filling  in  the  raft 
proper  with  solid  logs  of  spruce  and  cedar,  he  began 
heaping  cordwood  upon  it.  He  was  trying 
to  make  something  that  would  loom  up  above 
the  water,  he  explained;  "somethin'  tu  make  a 
showin'  in  the  pictur'."  He  had  three  or  four  teams 
hauling,  and  as  many  men  pihng,  for  two  days.  We 
stopped  him  at  fifty  cords  in  order  to  get  under  way 
the  second  day  after  our  return.  There  was  some 
division  of  opinion  among  the  'long  shore  loafers  as  to 
whether  or  not  this  was  the  largest  raft  that  had  ever 
started  down  this  part  of  the  Columbia,  but  they 
were  a  unit  in  agreeing  that  it  was  the  highest.  Never 
was  there  a  raft  with  so  much  "freeboard."  The 
trouble  was  that  every  foot  of  that  "freeboard"  was 
cordwood,  and  then  some;  for  the  huge  stacks  of  four- 
foot  firewood  had  weighted  down  the  logs  under  them 
until  those  great  lengths  of  spruce  and  cedar  were 
completely  submerged.    When  you  walked  about  "on 

235 


236  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

deck"  you  saw  the  river  flowing  right  along  through 
the  looselj^  stacked  cordwood  beneath.    Roos  was  ex- 
ultant over  the  way  that  mighty  mass  of  rough  wood 
charging  down  a  rock-walled  canyon  was  going  to 
photograph,  and  Ike  was  proud  as  a  peacock  over  the 
Thing  he  had  brought  into  being.     But  Roos  was 
going  to   be   cranking  on   the   cliff   when   we  went 
through  Hell  Gate,  and  Ike  didn't  care  a  fig  what 
happened  to  him  anyhow.    And  I  did  care.     There 
were  a  lot  of  things  that  could  happen  to  a  crazy  con- 
traption of  that  kind,  //  eve?'  it  hit  anything  solid;  and 
I  knew  that  the  walls  of  Hell  Gate  and  Box  Canyon 
must  be  sohd  or  they  wouldn't  have  stood  as  long  as 
they  had.    And  as  for  hitting  .  .  .  that  raft  must  be 
pretty  nearly  as  long  as  Hell  Gate  was  wide,  and  if 
ever  it  got  to  swinging.  .  .  .  It's  funny  the  things 
a  man  will  think  of  the  night  before  he  is  going  to 
try   out  a  fool   stunt  that  he  doesn't  know  much 
about. 

A  fine  motherly  old  girl  called  Mrs.  Miller  had 
put  us  up  in  her  big,  comfortable  farmhouse  during 
our  wait  while  Ike  completed  his  ship-building  oper- 
ations. She  must  have  known  all  of  seven  different 
ways  of  frying  chicken,  and  maybe  twice  that  number 
of  putting  up  apple  preserves.  We  had  just  about  all 
of  them  for  breakfast  the  morning  we  started.  Jess, 
the  ferry-man,  treated  us  to  vanilla  extract  cordials 
and  told  us  the  story  of  a  raft  that  had  struck  and 
broken  up  just  above  his  father's  ranch  near  Hawk 
Creek.  Only  guy  they  fished  out  was  always  nutty 
afterward.  Cracked  on  the  head  with  a  length  of 
cordwood  while  swimming.  Good  swimmer,  too ;  but 
a  guy  had  no  chance  in  a  swish-swashing  bunch  of 


.#  ^^"^^  \-  „  .\         E,  R ITISH 
«^.'.         ^^-W     „    COLUMBIA 


MAP  OF  THE  UPPER  COLUMBIA 


RAFTING  THROUGH  HELL  GATE     237 

broke-loose  logs.  Thus  Jess,  and  thus — or  in  similar 
vein — about  a  dozen  others  who  came  down  to  see  us 
off  from  the  ferry  landing.  They  all  told  stories  of 
raft  disasters,  just  as  they  would  have  enlarged  on 
boat  disasters  if  it  had  been  a  boat  in  which  we  were 
starting  to  run  Hell  Gate  and  Box  Canyon. 

I  pulled  across  and  landed  Roos  at  the  raft  to  make 
an  introductory  shot  or  two  of  Ike  before  picking  up 
the  thread  of  his  "continuity"  with  my  (pictorial) 
advent.  A  corner  of  the  raft  had  been  left  unfinished 
for  this  purpose.  Ike  was  discovered  boring  a  log 
with  a  huge  auger,  after  which  he  notched  and  laid  a 
stringer,  finishing  the  operation  by  pegging  the  latter 
down  with  a  twisted  hazel  withe.  The  old  river  rat 
seemed  to  know  instinctively  just  what  was  wanted 
of  him,  going  through  the  action  so  snappily  that  Roos 
clapped  him  on  the  back  and  pronounced  him  "the 
cat's  ears"  as  an  actor. 

Ike  showed  real  quality  in  the  next  scene;  also  the 
single-minded  concentration  that  marks  the  true 
artist.  Looking  up  from  his  boring,  he  sees  a  boat 
paddling  toward  him  from  up-river.  The  nearing 
craft  was  Imshallali,  with  the  "farmer"  at  the  oars, 
just  as  he  had  started  (for  the  still  unbuilt  raft) 
when  the  "prospector"  gave  him  the  boat  before  dis- 
appearing up  the  bank  to  the  "smelter"  with  his  sack 
of  "ore"  over  his  shoulder.  Thus  "continuity"  was 
served. 

The  "farmer"  pulls  smartly  alongside,  tosses  Ike 
the  painter  and  clambers  aboard  the  raft.  An  ani- 
mated colloquy  ensues,  in  which  the  "farmer"  asks 
about  the  river  ahead,  and  Ike  tells  him,  with  dramatic 
gestures,  that  it  will  be  death  to  tackle  it  in  so  frail 


238  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

a  skiff.  A  raft  is  the  only  safe  way  to  make  the  pas- 
sage and — here  Ike  spreads  out  his  hands  with  the 
manner  of  a  butler  announcing  that  "dinner  is 
served!" — the  raft  is  at  the  "farmer's"  disposal.  That 
suits  the  "farmer"  to  a  "T;"  so  the  skiff  is  lifted 
aboard  and  they  are  ready  to  cast  off. 

Where  Ike  displayed  the  concentration  of  a  true  ar- 
tist was  in  the  skiff-lifting  shot.  Just  as  the  green 
bow  of  Imshallah  came  over  the  side,  a  boy  who  had 
been  stacking  cordwood,  in  rushing  forward  to  clear 
the  fouled  painter,  stepped  on  an  unsecured  log  and 
went  through  into  the  river.  By  this  time,  of  course, 
I  knew  better  than  to  spoil  a  shot  by  suspending  or 
changing  action  in  the  middle  of  it,  but  that  Ike 
should  be  thus  esoterically  sapient  was  rather  too 
much  to  expect.  Yet  the  sequel  proved  how  much 
more  consummate  an  artist  of  the  two  of  us  that  un- 
tutored (even  by  Roos)  old  river  rat  was.  When  we 
had  finished  "  Yo-heave-ho-ing"  as  the  skiff  settled  into 
place,  I  (dropping  my  histrionics  like  a  wet  bathing 
suit)  shouted  to  Ike  to  come  and  help  me  fish  that  kid 
out.  "What  kid?"  he  drawled  in  a  sort  of  languid 
surprise.  Then,  after  a  kind  of  dazed  once-over  of 
the  raft,  fore-and-aft:  "By  cripes,  the  kid  is  gone!" 
Now  has  that  ever  been  beaten  for  artistic  concentra- 
tion? 

The  lad,  after  bumping  down  along  the  bottom  to 
the  lower  end  of  the  raft,  had  come  to  the  surface  no 
whit  the  worse  for  his  ducking.  He  was  clambering 
up  over  the  logs  like  a  wet  cat  before  either  Ike  or  I, 
teetering  across  the  crooked,  wobbly  cordwood,  had 
stumbled  half  the  distance  to  the  "stern."    "It  must 


RAFTING  THROUGH  HELL  GATE     239 

be  a  right  sma't  betta  goin'  daun  unda  than  up  heah," 
was  Ike's  only  comment. 

The  motor-boat  which  Ike  had  engaged  to  tow  the 
raft  was  already  on  hand.  It  had  been  built  by  a 
Spokane  mining  magnate  for  use  at  his  summer  home 
on  Lake  Coeur  d'Alene,  and  was  one  of  the  prettiest 
little  craft  of  the  kind  I  ever  saw.  With  its  lines 
streaming  gracefully  back  from  its  sharp,  beautifully- 
flared  bow,  it  showed  speed  from  every  angle.  Hard- 
wood and  brass  were  in  bad  shape,  but  the  engines 
were  resplendent;  and  the  engines  were  the  finest 
thing  about  it.  They  had  been  built  to  drive  it  twenty- 
five  miles  an  hour  when  she  was  new,  the  chap  run- 
ning it  said,  and  were  probably  good  for  all  of  twenty- 
two  yet  when  he  opened  up.  Except  that  its  hull 
wasn't  rugged  enough  to  stand  the  banging,  it  was  an 
ideal  river  boat,  though  not  necessarily  for  towing 
rafts.  However,  it  was  mighty  handy  even  at  that 
ignominious  work. 

I  couldn't  quite  make  up  my  mind  about  the  en- 
gineer of  the  motor  boat — not  until  he  settled  down 
to  work,  that  is.  His  eye  was  quite  satisfactory,  but 
his  habit  of  hesitating  before  answering  a  question, 
and  then  usually  saying  "I  dunno,"  conveyed  rather 
the  impression  of  torpid  mentality  if  not  actual  dul- 
ness.  Nothing  could  have  been  further  from  the  truth, 
as  I  realized  instantly  the  moment  he  started  swinging 
the  raft  into  the  current.  He  merely  said  "I  dunno" 
because  he  really  didn't  know,  where  an  ordinary  man 
would  have  felt  impelled  to  make  half  an  answer,  or 
at  least  to  say  something  about  the  weather  or  the 
stage  of  the  river.     Earl   (I  never  learned  his  last 


240  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

name)  was  sparing  with  his  tongue  because  he  was 
unsparing  with  his  brain.  His  mind  was  always  ready 
to  act — and  to  react.  There  were  to  arise  several  sit- 
uations well  calculated  to  test  the  mettle  of  him,  and 
he  was  always  "there."  I  have  never  known  so  thor- 
oughly useful  and  dependable  a  man  for  working  a 
launch  in  swift  water. 

While  Ike  was  completing  his  final  "snugging 
down"  operations,  I  chanced  to  observe  a  long  steel- 
blue  and  slightly  reddish-tinged  body  working  up  the 
bottom  toward  the  stern  of  the  raft.  It  looked  like 
a  salmon,  except  that  it  was  larger  than  any  member 
of  that  family  I  had  ever  seen.  A  blunt-pointed  pike- 
pole  is  about  the  last  thing  one  would  use  for  a  fish- 
spear,  but,  with  nothing  better  ready  to  hand,  I  tried 
it.  My  first  thrust  was  a  bad  miss,  but,  rather 
strangely,  I  thought — failed  to  deflect  the  loggily 
nosing  monster  more  than  a  foot  or  two  from  his 
course.  The  next  thrust  went  home,  but  where  I  wars 
half  expecting  to  have  the  pole  torn  from  my  hands 
by  a  wild  rush,  there  was  only  a  sluggish,  unresentful 
sort  of  a  wriggle.  As  there  was  no  hook  or  barb  to 
the  pike,  the  best  I  could  do  was  to  worry  my  prize 
along  the  bottom  to  the  bank,  where  a  couple  of  In- 
dians lifted  it  out  for  me.  It  was  a  salmon  after  all — 
a  vicious  looking  "dog,"  with  a  wicked  mouthful  of 
curving  teeth — but  of  extraordinary  size.  It  must 
have  weighed  between  fifty  and  sixty  pounds,  for  the 
pike-pole  all  but  snapped  when  I  tried  to  lift  the 
monster  with  it.  Indeed,  its  great  bulk  was  undoubt- 
edly responsible  for  the  fact  that  it  was  already  half- 
dead  from  battering  on  the  rocks  before  I  speared  it. 


RAFTING  THROUGH  HELL  GATE    241 

As  the  flesh  was  too  soft  even  for  the  Indians,  I  gave 
it  to  a  German  farmer  from  a  near-by  clearing  to  feed 
to  his  hogs.  Or  rather,  I  traded  it.  The  German  had 
a  dog  which,  for  the  sake  of  "human  interest,"  Roos 
very  much  wanted  to  borrow.  (Why,  seeing  it  was  a 
dog,  he  should  not  have  called  it  "canine  interest,"  I 
never  quite  understood;  but  it  was  the  "heart  touch" 
he  wanted,  at  any  rate).  So  Ike  proposed  to  the 
"Dutchman"  that  we  give  him  fifty  pounds  of  dead 
"dog"  for  half  that  weight  of  live  dog,  the  latter  to  be 
returned  when  we  were  through  with  him.  That  was 
Ike's  proposition.  As  soon  as  we  were  under  way, 
however,  he  confided  to  me  that  he  never  was  going 
to  give  that  good  collie  back  to  a  Dutchman.  A  peo- 
ple that  had  done  what  the  "Dutchmen"  did  to  Bel- 
gium had  no  right  to  have  a  collie  anyhow.  If  they 
must  have  dogs,  let  them  keep  dachshunds — or  pigs. 
And  he  forthwith  began  to  alienate  that  particular 
collie's  affection  by  feeding  him  milk  chocolate.  Poor 
old  Ike!  Being  only  a  fresh-water  sailor,  I  fear  he 
did  not  have  a  wife  in  every  port,  so  that  there  was  an 
empty  place  in  his  heart  that  craved  affection. 

We  cast  off  at  ten  o'clock,  Earl  swung  the  raft's 
head  out  by  a  steady  pull  with  the  launch,  and  the 
current  completed  the  operation  of  turning.  Once 
in  mid-stream  she  made  good  time,  the  motor-boat 
maintaining  just  enough  of  a  tug  to  keep  the  towing- 
line  taut  and  give  her  a  mile  an  hour  or  so  of  way  over 
the  current.  That  gave  Earl  a  margin  to  work  with, 
and,  pulling  sharply  now  to  one  side,  now  to  the  other, 
he  kept  the  great  pile  of  logs  headed  where  the  cur- 
rent was  swiftest  and  the  channel  clearest.    It  was  all 


242  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

in  using  his  power  at  the  right  time  and  in  the  right 
way.  A  hundred-ton  tugboat  would  have  been  help- 
less in  stopping  the  raft  once  it  started  to  go  in  the 
wrong  direction.  The  trick  was  to  start  it  right  and 
not  let  it  go  wrong,  Ike  explained — just  like  raising 
pups  or  kids.  It  was  certainly  no  job  for  a  novice, 
and  I  found  constant  reassurance  in  the  consummate 
"raftsmanship"  our  taciturn  engineer  w^as  displaying. 

The  hills  on  both  sides  of  the  river  grew  loftier  and 
more  rugged  as  we  ran  to  the  south,  and  the  trees 
became  patchier  and  scrubbier.  The  bunch  grass  on 
the  diminishing  benches  at  the  bends  was  withered  and 
brown.  It  was  evident  from  every  sign  that  we  were 
nearing  the  arid  belt  of  eastern  Washington,  the  great 
semi-desert  plateau  that  is  looped  in  the  bend  of  the 
Columbia  between  the  mouth  of  the  Spokane  and  the 
mouth  of  the  Snake.  The  towering  split  crest  of 
jNIitre  Rock  marked  the  approach  to  the  slack  stretch 
of  water  backed  up  by  the  boulder  barrage  over  which 
tumbles  Spokane  Rapids.  The  run  through  the  lat- 
ter w^as  to  be  our  real  baptism ;  a  short  rapid  passed  a 
few  miles  above  proving  only  rough  enough  to  set  the 
raft  rolling  in  fluent  undulations  and  throw  a  few 
light  gobs  of  spray  over  her  "bows."  We  were  now 
going  up  against  something  pretty  closely  approxi- 
mating the  real  thing.  It  wasn't  Hell  Gate  or  Box 
Canyon  by  a  long  way,  Ike  said,  but  at  the  same  time 
it  wasn't  any  place  to  risk  any  slip-up. 

Save  for  two  or  three  of  the  major  riffles  on  the  Big 
Bend  of  Canada,  Spokane  Rapids  has  a  stretch  of 
water  that  must  go  down  hill  just  about  as  fast  as  any 
on  all  the  Columbia.    The  channel — although  running 


RAFTING  THROUGH  HELL  GATE     243 

between  boulders — was  narrow  in  the  first  place,  and 
the  deepest  part  of  it  was  still  further  restricted  by 
an  attempt  to  clear  a  way  through  for  steamer  navi- 
gation in  the  years  when  a  through  service  up  and 
down  the  Columbia  was  still  dreamed  of.  The  chan- 
nel was  deepened  considerably,  but  the  effect  of  this 
was  to  divert  a  still  greater  flow  into  it  and  form  a 
sort  of  a  chute  down  which  the  water  rushed  as 
through  a  flume.  Being  straight,  this  channel  is  not 
very  risky  to  run,  even  with  a  small  boat — provided 
one  keeps  to  it.  A  wild  tumble  of  rollers  just  to  the 
left  of  the  head  must  be  avoided,  however,  even  by  a 
raft.  That  was  why  we  had  the  motor-boat — to  be 
sure  of  "hitting  the  intake  right,"  as  Ike  put  it.  And 
the  motor-boat  ought  to  be  able  to  handle  the  job 
without  help.  He  had  been  working  hard  ever  since 
we  started  on  a  gigantic  stern-sweep,  but  that  was  for 
Hell  Gate  and  Box  Canyon.  Here,  with  her  nose 
once  in  right,  she  should  do  it  on  her  own. 

Mooring  the  raft  against  the  right  bank  in  the 
quiet  water  a  couple  of  hundred  yards  above  the  "in- 
take," Earl  ran  us  down  to  the  mouth  of  the  Spokane 
River  in  the  launch.  We  were  purchasing  gasoline 
and  provisions  in  the  little  village  of  Lincoln,  just 
below  the  Spokane,  and  Ike  thought  that  the  lower 
end  of  the  rapid  would  be  the  best  place  for  Roos  to 
set  up  to  command  the  raft  coming  through.  It  was 
indeed  terrifically  fast  water,  but — because  the  launch 
had  the  power  to  pick  the  very  best  of  the  channel — 
the  run  down  just  missed  the  thrill  that  would  have 
accompanied  it  had  it  been  up  to  one's  oars  to  keep 
his  boat  out  of  trouble.    Earl  shut  off  almost  com- 


244  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

pletely  as  he  slipped  into  the  "V,"  keeping  a  bare 
steerage-way  over  the  current.  Twenty  miles  an  hour 
was  quite  fast  enough  to  be  going  in  the  event  she  did 
swerve  from  the  channel  and  hit  a  rock ;  there  was  no 
point  in  adding  to  the  potential  force  of  the  impact 
with  the  engine.  As  there  was  a  heavy  wash  from  the 
rapids  in  even  the  quietest  eddy  he  could  find  opposite 
the  town,  Earl  stayed  with  the  launch,  keeping  her 
off  the  rocks  with  a  pole  while  Ike,  Roos  and  myself 
went  foraging.  Ike  spilled  gasoline  over  his  back  in 
packing  a  leaking  can  down  over  the  boulders,  caus- 
ing burns  from  which  he  suffered  considerable  pain 
and  annoyance  when  he  came  to  man  the  sweep  the 
following  day. 

After  dropping  Roos  on  the  right  bank  to  set  up  for 
the  picture,  Earl  drove  the  launch  back  up  the  rapid 
to  the  raft.  I  hardly  know  which  was  the  more  im- 
pressive, the  power  of  the  wildly  racing  rapid  or  the 
power  of  the  engine  of  the  launch.  It  was  a  ding- 
dong  fight  all  the  way.  Although  he  nosed  at  times 
to  within  a  few  inches  of  the  overhanging  rocks  of  the 
bank  in  seeking  the  quietest  water,  the  launch  was 
brought  repeatedly  to  a  standstill.  There  she  would 
hang  quivering,  until  the  accelerating  engine  would 
impart  just  the  few  added  revolutions  to  the  propel- 
lers that  would  give  her  the  upper  hand  again.  The 
final  struggle  at  the  "intake"  was  the  bitterest  of  all, 
and  Earl  only  won  out  there  by  sheering  to  the  right 
across  the  "V" — at  imminent  risk  of  being  swung 
round,  it  seemed  to  me — and  reaching  less  impetuous 
water. 

Throwing  off  her  mooring  lines.  Earl  towed  the 


RAFTING  THROUGH  HELL  GATE    245 

raft  out  into  the  sluggish  current.  There  was  plenty 
of  time  and  plenty  of  room  to  manoeuvre  her  into  the 
proper  position.  All  he  had  to  do  was  to  bring  her 
into  the  "intake"  well  clear  of  the  rocks  and  rollers  to 
the  left,  and  then  keep  towing  hard  enough  to  hold 
her  head  down-stream.  It  was  a  simple  operation — 
compared,  for  instance,  with  what  he  would  have  on 
the  morrow  at  Hell  Gate — but  still  one  that  had  to 
be  carried  out  just  so  if  an  awful  mess-up  was  to  be 
avoided.  Novice  as  I  was  with  that  sort  of  a  raft,  I 
could  readily  see  what  would  happen  if  she  once  got 
to  swinging  and  turned  broadside  to  the  rapid. 

That  was  about  the  first  major  rapid  I  ever  recall 
running  when  I  didn't  have  something  to  do,  and  it 
was  rather  a  relief  to  be  able  to  watch  the  wheels  go 
round  and  feel  that  there  was  nothing  to  stand-by  for. 
Even  Ike,  with  no  sweep  to  swing,  was  foot-loose,  or 
rather  hand-free.  Knowing  Earl's  complete  capa- 
bility, he  prepared  to  cast  aside  navigational  worries 
for  the  nonce.  He  had  picked  up  his  axe  and  was  about 
to  turn  to  hewing  at  the  blade  of  his  big  steering- 
oar,  when  I  reminded  him  that  he  was  still  an  actor 
and  that  he  had  been  ordered  to  run  up  and  down  the 
raft  and  register  "great  anxiety"  while  within  range 
of  the  camera. 

Perhaps  the  outstanding  sensation  of  that  wild  run 
was  the  feeling  of  surprise  that  swept  over  me  at  the 
almost  uncanny  speed  with  which  that  huge  unwieldy 
mass  of  half  submerged  wood  gathered  way.  In  still 
water  it  would  have  taken  a  powerful  tug  many  min- 
utes to  start  it  moving;  here  it  picked  up  and  leapt 
ahead  like  a  motor-boat.    One  moment  it  was  drifting 


246  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

along  at  three  miles  an  hour;  five  seconds  later,  hav- 
ing slid  over  the  "intake,"  it  was  doing  more  than 
twenty.  The  actual  slope  of  that  first  short  pitch 
must  have  heen  all  of  one-in-ten,  so  that  I  found  my- 
self bracing  against  the  incline  of  the  raft,  as  when 
standing  in  a  wagon  that  starts  over  the  brow  of  a 
hill.  Then  tlie  pitch  eased  and  she  hit  the  rollers, 
grinding  right  through  them  like  a  floating  Jugger- 
naut. The  very  worst  of  them — haughty-headed 
combers  that  would  have  sent  the  skiff  sky-rocketing 
— simply  dissolved  against  the  logs  and  died  in  hissing 
anguish  in  the  tangle  of  cordwood.  The  motion  had 
nothing  of  the  jerkiness  of  even  so  large  a  craft  as  the 
launch,  and  one  noticed  it  less  under  his  feet  than 
when  he  looked  back  and  saw  the  wallowing  undula- 
tions of  the  "deck." 

But  best  of  all  was  the  contemptuous  might  with 
which  the  raft  stamped  out,  obliterated,  abolished  the 
accursed  whirlpools.  Spokane  was  not  deep  and 
steep-sided  enough  to  be  a  dangerous  whirlpool  rapid, 
like  the  Dalles  or  Hell  Gate,  but  there  were  still  a  lot 
of  mighty  mean-mouthed  "suckers"  lying  in  ambush 
where  the  rollers  began  to  flatten.  There  was  no 
question  of  their  arrogance  and  courage.  The  raft 
might  have  been  the  dainty  Imsliallah ,  with  her 
annoying  feminine  weakness  for  clinging  embraces, 
for  all  the  hesitancy  they  displayed  in  attacking  it. 
But,  oh,  what  a  difference!  Where  the  susceptible 
Imshallali  had  edged  off  in  coy  dalliance  and  ended 
by  all  but  surrendering,  the  raft  simply  thundered 
ahead.  The  siren  "whouf!"  of  the  lurking  brigand 
was  forced  back  down  its  black  throat  as  it  was  lit- 


RAFTING  THROUGH  HELL  GATE     247 

erally  effaced,  smeared  from  the  face  of  the  water. 
Gad,  how  I  loved  to  see  them  die,  after  all  Imslial- 
lah  and  I  had  had  to  endure  at  their  foul  hands !  Im- 
shallah,  perched  safely  aloft  on  a  stack  of  cordwood, 
took  it  all  with  the  rather  languid  interest  one  would 
expect  from  a  lady  of  her  quality ;  but  I — well,  I  fear 
very  much  that  I  was  leaning  out  over  the  "bows,"  at 
an  angle  not  wholly  safe  under  the  circumstances, 
and  registering  "ghoulish  glee"  at  the  exact  point 
where  Roos  had  told  me  three  times  that  I  must  be 
running  up  and  down  in  the  wake  of  Ike  and  regis- 
tering "great  anxiety." 

As  there  was  no  stopping  the  raft  within  a  mile 
or  two  of  the  foot  of  the  rapid,  it  had  been  arranged 
that  we  should  launch  the  skiff  as  soon  as  we  were 
through  the  worst  water,  and  pull  in  to  the  first  fav- 
ourable eddy  to  await  Roos  and  his  camera.  It  was 
Ike  bellowing  to  me  to  come  and  lend  him  a  hand  with 
the  skiff  that  compelled  me  to  relinquish  my  position 
at  the  "bow,"  where,  "thumbs  down"  at  everj^  clash, 
I  had  been  egging  on  the  raft  to  slaughter  whirlpools. 
The  current  was  still  very  swift,  so  that  Ike  was  car- 
ried down  a  considerable  distance  before  making  a 
landing.  As  it  was  slow  going  for  Roos,  laden  with 
camera  and  tripod,  over  the  boulders,  ten  or  fifteen 
minutes  elapsed  before  they  pushed  off  in  pursuit  of 
the  raft.  The  latter,  in  the  meantime,  had  run  a 
couple  of  miles  farther  down  river  before  Earl  found 
a  stretch  sufficiently  quiet  to  swing  her  round  and 
check  her  way  by  towing  up  against  the  current. 

In  running  down  to  this  point  the  raft  had  splashed 
through  a  slashing  bit  of  riffle,  which  I  afterwards 


248  DOAVN  THE  COLUMBIA 

learned  was  called  iSIiddle  Rapid  locally.  There  was 
a  short  stretch  of  good  rough  white  water.  Offhand, 
it  looked  to  me  rather  sloppier  than  anything  we  had 
put  the  skiff  into  so  far;  but,  as  it  appeared  there 
would  be  no  difficulty  in  steering  a  course  in 
fairly  smooth  water  to  the  left  of  th^  rollers, 
I  was  not  greatly  concerned  over  it.  Pres- 
ently Ike  came  pulling  round  the  bend  at  a  great  rate, 
and  the  next  thing  I  knew  Imshallali  was  flounder- 
ing right  down  the  middle  of  the  frosty-headed  com- 
bers. Twice  or  thrice  I  saw  the  "V"  of  her  bow  shoot 
skyward,  silhouetting  like  a  black  wedge  against  a 
fan  of  sun-shot  spray.  Then  she  began  riding  more 
evenly,  and  shortly  was  in  smoother  water.  It  was 
distinctly  the  kind  of  thing  she  did  best,  and  she  had 
come  through  with  flying  colours.  Roos  was  grinning 
when  he  climbed  aboard,  but  still  showed  a  tinge  of 
green  about  the  gills.  "Why  didn't  you  head  her  into 
that  smooth  stretch  on  the  left?"  I  asked.  "You  had 
the  steering  paddle."  "I  tried  to  hard  enough,"  he 
replied,  still  grinning,  "but  Ike  wouldn't  have  it. 
Said  he  kinda  suspected  she'd  go  through  that  white 
stuff  all  right,  and  wanted  to  see  if  his  suspicions 
were  correct."  And  that  was  old  Ike  Emerson  to 
a  "T." 

We  wallowed  on  through  French  Rapids  and 
Hawk  Creek  Rapids  in  the  next  hour,  and  past  the 
little  village  of  Peach,  nestling  on  a  broad  bench  in 
the  autumnal  red  and  gold  of  its  clustering  orchards. 
Ike,  pacing  the  "bridge"  with  me,  said  that  they  used 
to  make  prime  peach  brandy  at  Peach,  and  reckoned 
that  p'raps  .  .  .    "No,"  I  cut  in  decisively;  ""/  have 


RAFTING  THROUGH  HELL  GATE    249 

no  desire  to  return  to  Kettle  Falls."  I  had  jumped 
at  the  chance  to  draw  Ike  on  that  remarkable  up- 
river  journey  of  his  after  the  disaster  in  Hell  Gate, 
but  he  sheered  off  at  once.  I  have  grave  doubts  as 
to  whether  that  strange  phenomenon  ever  will  be 
explained. 

We  were  now  threading  a  great  canyon,  the  rocky 
walls  of  which  reared  higher  and  higher  in  fantastic 
pinnacles,  spires  and  weird  castellations  the  deeper 
we  penetrated  its  glooming  depths.  There  had  been 
painters  at  work,  too,  and  with  colourings  brighter  and 
more  varied  than  any  I  had  believed  to  exist  outside 
of  the  canyons  of  the  Colorado  and  the  Yellowstone. 
Saffron  melting  to  fawn  and  dun  was  there,  and 
vivid  streaks  that  were  almost  scarlet  where  fractures 
were  fresh,  but  had  changed  to  maroon  and  terra 
cotta  under  the  action  of  the  weather.  A  fluted  cliff- 
face,  touched  by  the  air-brush  of  the  declining  sun, 
flushed  a  pink  so  delicate  that  one  seemed  to  be  look- 
ing at  it  through  a  rosy  mist.  There  were  intenser 
blocks  and  masses  of  colours  showing  in  vivid  lumps 
on  a  buttressed  cliff  ahead,  but  they  were  quenched 
before  we  reached  them  in  a  flood  of  indigo  and  mauve 
shadows  that  drenched  the  chasm  as  the  sun  dropped 
out  of  sight.  From  the  heights  it  must  have  been  a 
brilliant  sunset,  flaming  with  intense  reds  and  yellows 
as  desert  sunsets  always  are;  but  looking  out  through 
the  purple  mists  of  the  great  gorge  there  was  only  a 
flutter  of  bright  pennons — crimson,  gold,  polished 
bronze  and  dusky  olive  green — streaming  across  an 
ever  widening  and  narrowing  notch  of  jagged  rock, 
black  and  opaque  like  splintered  ebony.  For  a  quarter 


250  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

of  an  hour  we  seemed  to  be  steering  for  those  shimmer- 
ing pennons  as  for  a  harbor  beacon;  then  a  sudden 
up-thrust  of  bhick  wall  cut  them  off  like  a  sliding 
door.  By  the  time  we  were  headed  west  again  the 
dark  pall  of  fallen  night  had  smothered  all  life  out 
of  the  flame-drenched  sky,  leaving  it  a  pure  transpar- 
ent black,  pricked  with  the  twinkle  of  kindling  stars. 
Only  by  the  absence  of  stars  below  could  one  trace  the 
blank  opacity  of  the  blacker  black  of  the  towering 
chffs. 

'No  one  had  said  anything  to  me  about  an  all-day- 
and-all-night  schedule  for  the  raft,  and,  as  a  matter 
of  fact,  running  in  the  night  had  not  entered  into  the 
original  itinerary  at  all.  The  reason  we  were  bump- 
ing along  in  the  dark  now  was  that  Ike,  who  had  no 
more  idea  of  time  than  an  Oriental,  had  pushed  off 
from  Gerome  an  hour  late,  wasted  another  unneces- 
sary hour  in  Lincoln  yarning  across  the  sugar  barrel 
at  the  general  store,  and,  as  a  consequence,  had  been 
overtaken  by  night  ten  miles  above  the  point  he 
wanted  to  make.  As  there  was  no  fast  water  inter- 
vening, and  as  Earl  had  shown  no  signs  of  dissent, 
Ike  had  simply  gone  right  on  ahead  regardless. 
When  I  asked  him  if  it  wasn't  a  bit  risky,  he  said  he 
thought  not  very;  adding  comfortingly  that  he  had 
floated  down  on  rafts  a  lot  of  times  before,  and  hadn't 
"alius  bumped."  If  he  could  see  to  tighten  up 
stringer  pegs,  he  reckoned  Earl  ought  to  be  able  to 
see  rocks,  "  'cose  rocks  was  a  sight  bigger'n  pegs." 

It  was  not  long  after  Ike  had  nullified  the  effect  of 
his  reassuring  philosophy  by  smearing  the  end  of  his 
thumb   with    a   mallet   that   Earl's   night-owl    eyes 


RAFTING  THROUGH  HELL  GATE    251 

played  him  false  to  the  extent  of  overlooking  a  rock. 
It  may  well  have  been  a  very  small  rock,  and  it 
was  doubtless  submerged  a  foot  or  more ;  so  there  was 
no  use  expecting  a  man  to  see  the  ripple  above  it 
when  there  wasn't  Hght  enough  to  indicate  the  passage 
of  his  hand  before  his  eyes.    It  was  no  fault  of  Earl's 
at  all,  and  even  the  optimistic  Ike  had  claimed  no 
more  than  that  he  hadn't  "alius  bumped."    Nor  was 
it  a  very  serious  matter  at  the  worst.    The  raft  merely 
hesitated   a  few   seconds,   swung   part   way  round, 
slipped  free  again  and,  her  head  brought  back  at  the 
pull  of  the  launch,  resumed  her  way.     The  jar  of 
striking  was  not  enough  to  throw  a  well-braced  man 
off  his  feet.     (The  only  reason  Roos  fell  and  pulped 
his  ear  was  because  he  had  failed  to  set  himself  at  the 
right  angle  when  the  shock  came.)     The  worst  thing 
that  happened  was  the  loss  of  a  dozen  or  so  cords  of 
wood  which,  being  unsecurely  stacked,  toppled  over 
when  she  struck.     Luckily,  the  boat  was  parked  on 
the  opposite  side,  as  was  also  Roos.    It  would  have 
been  hard  to  pick  up  either  before  morning,   and 
Roos  would  hardly  have  lasted.     The  wood  was  a 
total  loss  to  Ike,  of  course ;  but  he  was  less  concerned 
about  that  than  he  was  over  the  fact  that  it  reduced 
her  "freeboard"  on  that  quarter  by  three  feet,  so  that 
she  wouldn't  make  so  much  of  a  "showin'  in  the  pic- 
ters."    He  did  raise  a  howl  the  next  morning,  though. 
That  was  when  he  found  that  his  old  denim  jacket 
had  gone  over  with  the  cordwood.     It  wasn't  the 
"wamus"  itself  he  minded  so  much,  he  said,  but  the 
fact  that  in  one  of  that  garment's  pockets  had  been 
stored  the  milk  chocolate  which  he  was  using  to  alien- 


252  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

ate  the  affections  of  the  Dutchman's  collie.  "It's 
all  in  gettin'  a  jump  on  a  pu^^'s  feelin's  at  the  fust 
offsta't,"  he  philosophied  bitterly;  "an'  naow  I'll  be 
losin'  mah  jump."  Rather  keen  on  the  psychology 
of  alienation,  that  observation  of  old  Ike,  it  struck 
me. 

It  was  along  toward  nine  o'clock,  and  shortly  after 
the  abrupt  walls  of  the  canyon  began  to  fall  away 
somewhat,  that  a  light  appeared  on  the  left  bank. 
Making  a  wide  circle  just  above  what  had  now  be- 
come a  glowing  window-square,  Earl  brought  the 
raft's  head  up-stream  and  swung  her  in  against  the 
bank.  The  place  was  marked  Creston  on  the  maps, 
but  appeared  to  be  spoken  of  locally  as  Halberson's 
Ferry.  We  spent  the  night  with  the  hospitable  Hal- 
bersons,  who  ran  the  ferry  across  to  the  Colville 
Reservation  side  and  operated  a  small  sawmill  when 
logs  were  available.  Earl  slept  at  his  ranch,  a  few 
miles  away  on  the  mesa. 

The  night  was  intensely  cold,  and  I  was  not  sur- 
prised to  find  icicles  over  a  foot  long  on  the  flume 
behind  the  house  in  the  morning.  The  frozen  ground 
returned  a  metallic  clank  to  the  tread  of  my  hob- 
nailed boots  as  I  stepped  outside  the  door.  Then  I 
gave  a  gasp  of  amazement,  for  what  did  I  see  but  Ike 
running — with  a  light,  springing  step — right  along 
the  surface  of  the  river?  At  my  exclamation  one  of 
the  Halbersons  left  off  toweling  and  came  over  to 
join  me.  "What's  wrong?"  he  asked,  swinging  his 
arms  to  keep  warm.  "Wrong!"  I  ejaculated;  "look 
at  that!  I  know  this  isn't  Galilee;  but  you  don't 
mean  to  tell  rne  the  Columbia  has  frozen  over  during 


RAFTING  THROUGH  HELL  GATE    253 

the  night!"  "Hardly  that,"  was  the  laughing  answer. 
"Ike's  not  running  on  either  the  ice  or  the  water;  he's 
just  riding  a  water-soaked  log  to  save  walking.  It's 
an  old  trick  of  his.  Not  many  can  do  it  like  he  can." 
And  that  was  all  there  was  to  it.  Ike  had  spotted  a 
drift-log  stranded  a  short  distance  up-river,  and  was 
simply  bringing  it  down  the  easiest  way  so  as  to  lash 
it  to  the  raft  and  take  it  to  market.  But  I  should 
have  hated  to  have  seen  a  thing  like  that  "water- 
walking"  effect  in  those  long  ago  days  on  the  Ca- 
nadian Big  Bend,  when  we  used  to  prime  our  break- 
fast coffee  with  a  couple  of  fingers  of  "thirty  per 
overproof." 

We  cast  off  at  nine-thirty,  after  Ike  had  laid  in 
some  more  "component  parts"  of  his  mighty  sweep 
at  the  little  sawmill.  Although  less  deeply  encan- 
yoned  than  through  the  stretch  down  which  we  passed 
the  previous  night,  there  were  still  enormously  high 
cliffs  on  both  sides  of  the  river.  Trees  and  brush 
were  scarcer  and  scrubbier  than  above,  and  the  gen- 
eral aspect  was  becoming  more  and  more  like  the 
semi-arid  parts  of  the  Colorado  Desert.  The  col- 
ouring was  somewhat  less  vivid  than  the  riot  in  the  can- 
yon above,  but  was  almost  equally  varied.  The  colour- 
effect  was  diversified  along  this  part  of  the  river  by 
the  appearance  of  great  patches  of  rock-growing 
lichen,  shading  through  half  a  dozen  reds  and  browns 
to  the  most  dehcate  amethyst  and  sage-green.  At 
places  it  was  impossible  to  tell  from  the  river  where 
the  mineral  pigments  left  off  and  the  vegetable  coat- 
ing began. 

The  river  was  broad  and  widening,  with  a  compar- 


254  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

atively  slow  current  and  only  occasional  stretches  of 
white  water.  I  took  the  occasion  to  launch  the  skiff 
and  paddle  about  for  an  hour,  trying  to  get  some  line 
on  the  speed  at  which  the  raft  was  towing.  In  smooth 
water  I  found  I  had  the  legs  of  her  about  three-to- 
one,  and  in  rapids  of  about  two-to-one.  From  this 
I  figured  that  she  did  not  derive  more  than  from  a 
mile  and  a  half  to  two  miles  an  hour  of  her  speed 
from  the  launch.  I  only  raced  her  through  one  bit 
of  rapid,  and  she  was  such  a  poor  sport  about  the 
course  that  I  refused  to  repeat  the  stunt.  Just  as  I 
began  to  spurt  past  her  down  through  the  jumping 
white  caps  she  did  a  sort  of  a  side-slip  and  crowded 
me  out  of  the  channel  and  into  a  rather  messy  souse- 
hole.  The  outraged  Imshallah  gulped  a  big  mouth- 
ful, but  floundered  through  right-side  up,  as  she 
always  seemed  able  to  do  in  that  sort  of  stuff.  But 
I  pulled  into  an  eddy  and  let  the  hulking  old  wood- 
pile have  the  right-of-way,  declining  Earl's  tooted 
challenge  for  a  brush  in  the  riffle  immediately  follow- 
ing. A  monster  that  could  eat  whirlpools  alive  wasn't 
anything  for  a  skiff  to  monkey  with  the  business  end 
of.  I  boarded  her  respectfully  by  the  stern  and 
pulled  Imshallah  up  after  me. 

The  great  bald  dome  of  White  Rock,  towering  a 
thousand  feet  above  the  left  bank  of  the  river,  sig- 
nalled our  approach  to  Hell  Gate.  Towing  across  a 
broad  reach  of  quiet  water.  Earl  laid  the  raft  against 
the  left  bank  about  half  a  mile  above  where  a  pair  of 
black  rock  jaws,  froth-flecked  and  savage,  seemed 
closing  together  in  an  attempt  to  bite  the  river  in  two. 


RAFTING  THROUGH  HELL  GATE     255 

That  was  as  close  as  it  was  safe  to  stop  the  raft,  Earl 
explained  as  we  made  fast  the  mooring  lines,  for  the 
current  began  to  accelerate  rapidly  almost  immedi- 
ately below.  There  were  some  shacks  and  an  ancient 
apple  orchard  on  the  bench  above,  and  Ike  came  over 
to  whisper  that  they  used  to  make  some  mighty  kicky 
cider  there  once  upon  a  time,  and  perhaps.  ...  I 
did  not  need  the  prompting  of  Earl's  admonitory 
head-shake.  "Get  a  jump  on  you  with  the  sweep,"  I 
said,  "while  Earl  and  I  go  down  and  help  Roos  set 
up.  There'll  be  time  enough  to  talk  about  cider  be- 
low Hell  Gate."  I  saw  a  somewhat  (to  judge  from  a 
distance)  Bacchantic  ciderette  picking  her  way  down 
the  bench  bank  to  the  raft  as  the  launch  sped  off  down 
stream,  but  if  Ike  realized  dividends  from  the  visit 
there  was  never  anything  to  indicate  it. 

Although  Hell  Gate  is  a  long  ways  from  being  the 
worst  rapid  on  the  Columbia,  it  comes  pretty  near  to 
qualifying  as  the  worst  looking  rapid.  A  long  black 
reef,  jutting  out  from  the  left  bank,  chokes  the 
river  into  a  narrow  channel  and  forces  it  over 
against  the  rocky  wall  on  the  right.  It  shoots 
between  these  obstructions  with  great  velocity,  only 
to  split  itself  in  two  against  a  big  rock  island  a  hun- 
dred yards  farther  down.  The  more  direct  channel 
is  to  the  right,  but  it  is  too  narrow  to  be  of  use.  The 
main  river,  writhing  like  a  wounded  snake  after  being 
bounced  off  the  sheer  wall  of  the  island,  zigzags  on 
through  the  black  basaltic  barrier  in  a  course  shaped 
a  good  deal  like  an  elongated  letter  "Z."  Hell  Gate 
is  very  much  like  either  the  Great  or  Little  Dalles 


256  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

would  be  if  a  jog  were  put  into  it  by  an  earthquake — 
a  rapid  sliaped  like  a  flash  of  lightning,  and  with  just 
as  much  kick  in  it. 

After  much  climbing  and  scrambling  over  rocks, 
Roos  found  a  place  about  half  way  down  the  left  side 
of  the  jagged  gorge  from  which  he  could  command 
the  raft  rounding  the  first  leg  of  the  "Z"  and  running 
part  of  the  second  leg.  It  would  have  taken  a  half 
dozen  machines  to  cover  the  whole  run  through,  but 
the  place  he  had  chosen  was  the  one  which  would 
show  the  most  one  camera  could  be  expected  to  get. 
It  would  miss  entirely  the  main  thing — the  fight  to 
keep  the  raft  from  bumping  the  rock  island  and  split- 
ting in  two  like  the  river  did.  That  could  not  be 
helped,  however.  A  set  up  in  a  place  to  catch  that 
would  have  caught  very  little  else,  and  we  desired  to 
show  something  of  the  general  character  of  the  gorge 
and  rapid.  Roos,  solacing  himself  with  the  remark  to 
the  effect  that,  if  the  raft  did  break  up,  probably  the 
biggest  part  of  the  wreck  would  come  down  his  side, 
was  cutting  himself  a  "sylvan  frame"  through  the 
branches  of  a  gnarled  old  screw  pine  as  we  left  him 
to  go  to  the  launch. 

Ike  was  sitting  on  the  bank  talking  with  a  couple 
of  men  from  the  farm-house  when  we  got  back  to  the 
raft.  He  had  completed  the  sweep,  he  said,  but  as 
he  had  forgotten  to  provide  any  "pin"  to  hang  it  on 
he  didn't  quite  know  what  to  do.  Perhaps  we  had 
better  go  up  to  the  farm-house  and  have  dinner  first, 
and  then  maybe  he  would  think  of  something.  The 
thought  of  keeping  Roos — whom  I  had  seen  on  the 
verge  of  apoplexy  over  a  half  minute  delay  once 


RAFT    IN    TOW   OF   LAUNCH    NEAR   MOUTH   OF   SA.N    FOIL    {above) 
IXE  AT  THE  SWEEP  EELOW  HELL  GATE    (  bcIow) 


RAFTING  THROUGH  HELL  GATE     257 

he  was  ready  for  action — standing  with  crooked  elbow 
at  his  crank,  waiting  an  hour  or  more  for  the  raft  to 
shoot  round  the  bend  the  next  second,  struck  me  as 
so  ludicrous  that  I  had  to  sit  down  myself  to  laugh 
without  risk  of  rolling  into  the  river.  When  I  finally 
got  my  breath  and  sight  back,  I  found  Earl's  ready 
mind  had  hit  upon  the  idea  of  using  the  hickory  adze 
handle  as  a  pivot  for  the  sweep  and  that  he  and  Ike 
were  already  rigging  it.  Ten  minutes  later  the  launch 
had  swung  the  raft  out  into  the  current  and  we  were 
headed  for  Hell  Gate. 

The  sweep,  clumsy  as  it  looked,  was  most  ingeni- 
ously constructed.  Its  handle  was  a  four-inch-in-di- 
ameter  fir  trunk,  about  twenty  feet  in  length.  One 
end  of  it  had  been  hewn  down  to  give  hand-grip  on  it, 
and  the  other  split  to  receive  the  blade.  The  latter 
was  a  twelve-foot  plank,  a  foot  and  a  half  in  width 
and  three  inches  in  thickness,  roughly  rounded  and 
hewn  to  the  shape  of  the  flat  of  an  oar.  It  was  set  at 
a  slight  upward  tilt  from  the  fir-trunk  handle.  Ike 
had  contrived  to  centre  the  weight  of  the  whole  sweep 
so  nicely  that  you  could  swing  it  on  its  adze-handle 
pivot  with  one  hand.  Swing  it  in  the  air,  I  mean; 
submerged,  five  or  six  men  would  have  been  none  too 
few  to  force  that  colossal  blade  through  the  water. 
Ike  admitted  that  himself,  but  reckoned  that  the  two 
of  us  ought  to  be  'better'n  nothin'  'tall.' " 

As  we  swung  out  into  the  quickening  current,  I 
mentioned  to  Ike  that,  as  I  had  never  even  seen  a 
sweep  of  that  kind  in  operation,  much  less  worked  at 
it  myself,  it  might  now  be  in  order  for  him  to  give  me 
some  idea  of  what  he  hoped  to  do  with  it,  and  how. 


258  DOWN  THE  COLU^IBIA 

"Ye're  right,"  he  assented,  after  ejecting  the  inevita- 
ble squirt  of  tobacco  and  parking  the  residuary  quid 
out  of  the  way  of  his  tongue  as  a  squirrel  stows  a  nut ; 
"ye're  right;  five  minutes  fer  eloosidashun  an' 
r'h'rsal."  As  usual,  Ike  overestimated  the  time  at  his 
disposal;  nevertheless,  his  intensive  method  of  train- 
ing was  so  much  to  the  point  that  I  picked  up  a 
"right  smart  bit  o'  sweep  dope"  before  we  began  to 
cram  into  the  crooked  craw  of  Hell  Gate. 

This  was  the  biggest  raft  he  had  ever  tried  to  take 
through,  Ike  explained,  but  he'd  never  had  so  power- 
ful a  motor  launch ;  and  Earl  was  the  best  man  in  his 
line  on  the  Columbia.  He  reckoned  that  the  launch 
would  be  able  to  swing  the  head  of  the  raft  clear  of  the 
rock  island  where  the  river  split  "agin"  it;  but  swing- 
ing out  the  head  would  have  the  effect  of  swinging  in 
the  stern.  We  were  to  man  the  sweep  for  the  purpose 
of  keeping  the  raft  from  striking  amidships.  We 
would  only  have  to  stroke  one  way,  but  we'd  sure 
have  to  "jump  into  it  billy  hell!"  "That  being  so,"  I 
suggested,  "perhaps  we  better  try  a  practice  stroke  or 
two  to  perfect  our  teamwork."  That  struck  Ike  as 
reasonable,  and  so  we  w^ent  at  it,  he  on  the  extreme  end 
of  the  handle,  I  one  "grip"  farther  along. 

Pressing  the  handle  almost  to  our  feet  in  order  to 
elevate  the  blade,  we  dipped  the  latter  with  a  swing- 
ing upward  lift  and  jumped  into  the  stroke.  In 
order  to  keep  the  blade  well  submerged,  it  was  neces- 
sary to  exert  almost  as  much  force  upward  as  for- 
ward. The  compression  on  the  spine  was  rather 
awful — especially  as  I  w^ns  two  or  three  inches  taller 
than  Ike,  and  on  top  of  that,  had  the  "inside"  berth, 


RAFTING  THROUGH  HELL  GATE     259 

where  the  handle  was  somewhat  nearer  the  deck.  But 
the  blade  moved  through  the  water  when  we  both 
straightened  into  it ;  slowly  at  first,  and  more  rapidly 
toward  the  end  of  the  stroke.  Then  we  lifted  the 
blade  out  of  the  water,  and  Ike  swung  it  back  through 
the  air  alone.  I  had  only  to  "crab-step"  back  along 
the  runway — a  couple  of  planks  laid  over  the  cord- 
wood — and  be  ready  for  the  next  stroke.  Twice  we 
went  through  that  operation,  without — so  far  as  I 
could  see — having  any  effect  whatever  upon  the  raft ; 
but  that  was  only  because  I  was  expecting  "skiff- 
action"  from  a  hundred  tons  of  logs.  We  really 
must  have  altered  the  course  considerably,  for  pres- 
ently a  howl  came  back  from  Earl  to  "do  it  t'other 
way,"  as  we  were  throwing  her  out  of  the  channel. 
By  the  time  we  had  "corrected"  with  a  couple  of 
strokes  in  the  opposite  direction  the  launch  was  dip- 
ping over  the  crest  of  the  "intake."  Straightening 
up  but  not  relinquishing  the  handle,  Ike  said  to  "let 
'er  ride  fer  a  minnit,"  but  to  stand-by  ready. 

That  swift  opening  run  through  the  outer  portal  of 
Hell  Gate  offered  about  the  only  chance  I  had  for  a 
"look-see."  My  recollections  of  the  interval  that  fol- 
lowed at  the  sweep  are  a  good  deal  blurred.  I  noted 
that  the  water  of  the  black -walled  chasm  down  which 
we  were  racing  was  swift  and  deep,  but  not — right 
there  at  least — too  rough  for  the  skiff  to  ride.  I 
noted  how  the  sharp  point  of  the  rock  island  ahead 
threw  off  two  unequal  back-curving  waves,  as  a  bat- 
tleship will  do  when  turning  at  full  speed.  I  remem- 
ber thinking  that,  if  I  were  in  the  skiff,  I  would  try  to 
avoid  the  island  by  sheering  over  to  the  right-hand 


260  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

channel.  It  looked  too  hard  a  pull  to  make  the  main 
one  to  the  left;  and  the  latter  would  have  the  worst 
whirlpools,  too.  I  noted  how  confoundedly  in  the 
way  of  the  river  that  sharp-nosed  island  was ;  and  not 
only  of  the  river,  but  of  anything  coming  down  the 
river.  AVith  that  up-stabbing  point  out  of  the  stream, 
how  easy  it  would  be!    But  since  .  .  . 

"Stan'-by!"  came  in  a  growl  from  Ike.  "  'Memba 
naow — 'billy  hell'  when  I  says  'jump!'  "  By  the  fact 
that  he  spat  forth  the  whole  of  his  freshly-bitten  quid 
I  had  a  feeling  that  the  emergency  was  considerably 
beyond  the  ordinary.  IVIy  last  clear  recollection  was 
of  Earl's  sharply  altering  his  course  just  before  he 
nosed  into  the  roaring  back-curving  wave  thrown  off 
by  the  island  and  beginning  to  tow  to  the  left  with 
his  line  at  half  of  a  right-angle  to  the  raft.  The  stac- 
cato of  his  accelerating  engine  cut  like  the  rattle  of  a 
machine-gun  through  the  heavy  rumble  of  the  rapid, 
and  I  knew  that  he  had  thrown  it  wide  open  even  be- 
fore the  foam-geyser  kicked  up  by  the  propellers  be- 
gan to  tumble  over  onto  the  stern  of  the  launch.  On  a 
reduced  scale,  it  was  the  same  sort  of  in-tumbling 
jet  that  a  destroyer  throws  up  when,  at  the  appear- 
ance of  an  ominous  blur  in  the  fog,  she  goes  from 
quarter-speed-ahead  to  full-speed-astern.  A  jet  like 
that  means  that  the  spinning  screws  are  meeting 
almost  solid  resistance  in  the  water. 

Ike's  shoulder  cut  off  my  view  ahead  now,  and  I 
knew  that  the  bow  was  swinging  out  only  from  the 
way  the  stern  was  swinging  in.  At  his  grunted 
"Now!"  we  did  our  curtsey-and-bow  to  the  sweep- 
handle,  just  as  we  had  practised  it,  then  dipped  the 


RAFTING  THROUGH  HELL  GATE    261 

blade  and  drove  it  hard  to  the  right.  Four  or  five 
times  we  repeated  that  stroke,  and  right  smartly,  too, 
it  seemed  to  me.  The  stern  stopped  swinging  just  at 
the  right  time,  shooting  by  the  foam-whitened  fang 
of  the  black  point  by  a  good  ten  feet.  The  back- 
curving  wave  crashed  down  in  solid  green  on  the  star- 
board quarter — but  harmlessly.  There  was  water 
enough  to  have  swamped  a  hatteau,  but  against  a  raft 
the  comber  had  knocked  its  head  off  for  nothing. 

Under  Ike's  assurance  that  the  battle  would  all  be 
over  but  the  shouting  in  half  a  minute,  I  had  put 
about  everything  I  had  into  those  half  dozen  mighty 
pushes  with  the  sweep.  I  started  to  back  ofip  leisurely 
and  resume  my  survey  of  the  scenery  as  we  cleared  the 
point,  but  Ike's  mumbled  "Nother  one!"  brought  me 
back  to  the  sweep  again.  Evidently  there  had  been 
some  kind  of  a  slip-up.  "Wha'  'smatter?"  I  gur- 
gled, as  we  swayed  onto  the  kicking  handle,  and 
"Engin's  on  bhnk,"  rumbled  the  chesty  reply.  "Gotta 
keep'er  off  wi'  sweep." 

It  had  been  the  motor-boat's  role,  after  keeping  the 
head  of  the  raft  clear  of  the  point  of  the  island  by  a 
strong  side  pull,  to  tow  out  straight  ahead  again  as 
soon  as  the  menace  of  collision  was  past.  Earl  was 
trying  to  do  this  now  (I  glimpsed  as  I  crab-stepped 
back),  but  with  two  or  three  cylinders  missing  was 
not  able  to  do  much  more  than  straighten  out  the  tow- 
line.  As  the  raft  was  already  angling  to  the  channel, 
the  fact  the  current  was  swifter  against  the  side  of 
the  island  had  the  tendency  to  throw  her  stern  in  that 
direction.  It  was  up  to  the  sweep  to  keep  her  from 
striking,  just  as  it  had  been  at  the  point.    What  made 


262  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

it  worse  now  was  that  the  possible  points  of  impact 
were  scattered  all  the  way  along  for  two  or  three 
hundred  yards,  while  the  launch  was  giving  very 
little  help. 

A  man  ought  to  be  able  to  lean  onto  a  sweep  all 
day  long  without  getting  more  than  a  good  comfort- 
able weariness,  and  so  I  could  have  done  had  I  been 
properly  broken  in.  But  I  was  in  the  wrong  place 
on  the  sweep,  and,  on  top  of  that,  had  allowed  my  in- 
fantile enthusiasm  to  lead  me  into  trying  to  scoop 
half  the  Columbia  out  of  its  channel  at  every  stroke. 
And  so  it  was  that  when  we  came  to  a  real  show- 
down, I  found  myself  pretty  hard  put  to  come 
through  with  what  was  needed.  Ike's  relentless 
"  'Nother  one!"  at  the  end  of  each  soul-and-body 
wracking  stroke  was  all  that  was  said,  but  the  'tween- 
teethed  grimness  of  its  utterance  was  more  potent 
as  a  verbal  scourge  than  a  steady  stream  of  sulphu- 
rous curses.  Ike  was  saving  his  breath,  and  I  didn't 
have  any  left  to  pour  out  my  feelings  with. 

We  were  close  to  the  ragged  black  wall  all  the  way, 
and  I  have  an  idea  that  the  back -waves  thrown  off 
by  the  projecting  points  had  about  as  much  to  do 
with  keeping  us  from  striking  as  had  the  sweep.  Such 
waves  will  often  buffer  off  a  canoe  or  hatteau,  and 
they  must  have  helped  some  with  the  raft.  There  is 
no  doubt,  however,  that,  if  the  raft  had  once  been 
allowed  to  swing  broadside,  either  she  or  the  rock 
island  would  have  had  to  change  shape  or  else  hold  up 
the  million  or  so  horse-power  driving  the  Columbia. 
That  could  have  only  resulted  in  a  one-two-three 
climax,  with  the  island,  Columbia  and  raft  finishing 


RAFTING  THROUGH  HELL  GATE    263 

in  the  order  named.  Or,  to  express  it  in  more  ac- 
curate race-track  vernacular;  "Island,"  first;  "Colum- 
bia," second;  "Raft,"  nowhere! 

My  spine  was  a  bar  of  red-hot  iron  rasping  up  and 
down  along  the  exposed  ends  of  all  its  connecting 
nerves,  when  a  throaty  "Aw  right!"  from  Ike  sig- 
nalled that  the  worst  was  past.  Hanging  over  the  end 
of  the  trailing  sweep-handle,  I  saw  that  the  raft  had 
swung  into  a  big  eddy  at  the  foot  of  the  island,  and 
that  the  launch,  with  its  engine  still  spraying  scat- 
tered pops,  was  trying  to  help  the  back-current  carry 
her  in  to  the  right  bank.  Middle  and  Lower  Rapids 
of  Hell  Gate  were  still  below  us,  but  Earl  had  evi- 
dently determined  not  to  run  them  until  his  engine 
was  hitting  on  all  fours  again.  It  was  characteristic 
of  him  that  he  didn't  offer  any  explanation  as  to  what 
had  gone  wrong,  or  why;  but  the  trouble  must  have 
been  a  consequence  of  the  terrific  strain  put 
on  the  engine  in  towing  the  head  of  the  raft 
clear  of  the  upper  point  of  the  island.  At 
the  end  of  a  quarter  hour's  tinkering  Earl  reckoned 
that  the  engine  would  go  "purty  good"  now;  least- 
ways, he  hoped  so,  for  there  was  nothing  more  he 
could  do  outside  of  a  machine-shop.  To  save  tying  up 
again  below,  he  ran  across  and  picked  up  Roos  and 
the  camera  before  casting  off. 

Middle  and  Lower  Rapids  were  just  straight,  fast, 
white  water,  and  we  ran  them  without  trouble.  Roos 
set  up  on  the  raft  and  shot  a  panorama  of  the  reeling 
rollers  and  the  flying  black  curtains  of  the  rocky 
walls  as  they  slid  past.  Then  he  made  a  close-up  of 
the  weird,  undulating  Chinese-Dragon-wiggle  of  the 


204  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

"deck"  of  the  raft,  and  finally,  when  we  had  recov- 
ered a  bit  of  breath,  of  Ike  and  me  toiling  at  the 
sweep.  To  save  time,  we  had  lunch  on  the  raft,  tak- 
ing Earl's  portion  up  to  him  in  the  skiff. 

Ike,  announcing  that  he  would  need  a  crew  of  four 
or  five  men  to  handle  the  raft  in  Box  Canj^on,  was 
scouting  for  hands  all  afternoon.  Whenever  a  farm 
or  a  ferry  appeared  in  the  distance,  we  would  pull 
ahead  in  the  skiff  and  he  would  dash  ashore  and  pur- 
sue intensive  recruiting  until  the  raft  had  come  up 
and  gone  on  down  river.  Then  we  would  push  off 
and  chase  it,  repeating  the  performance  as  soon  as 
another  apple  orchard  or  ferry  tower  crept  out  be- 
yond a  bend.  For  all  our  zeal,  there  was  not  a  man 
to  show  when  we  finally  pulled  the  skiff  aboard  as 
darkness  was  falling  on  the  river.  INIost  of  the  men 
Ike  talked  to  took  one  look  at  the  nearing  raft  and 
cut  him  off  with  a  "Good-night"  gesture,  the  signifi- 
cance of  which  was  not  lost  on  me  even  in  the  distant 
skiff.  The  nearest  we  came  to  landing  any  one  was 
at  Plum,  where  the  half-breed  ferry-man  said  he 
would  have  gone  if  it  hadn't  been  for  the  fact  that  his 
wife  was  about  to  become  a  mother.  It  wasn't  that 
he  was  worried  on  the  woman's  account  (she  did  that 
sort  of  thing  quite  regularly  without  trouble),  but 
he  had  bet  a  horse  with  the  blacksmith  that  it  was 
going  to  be  a  boy,  and  he  kind  of  wanted  to  be  on 
hand  to  be  sure  they  didn't  put  anything  over  on  him. 

At  Clark's  Ferry  an  old  pal  of  Ike's,  whom  he  had 
confidently  counted  on  getting,  not  only  refused  to 
go  when  he  saw  the  raft,  but  even  took  the  old  river 
rat  aside  and  talked  to  him  long  and  earnestly,  after 


RAFTING  THROUGH  HELL  GATE     265 

the  manner  of  a  brother.  Ike  was  rather  depressed 
after  that,  and  spent  the  next  hour  slouching  back  and 
forth  across  the  stern  runway,  nursing  the  handle  of 
the  gently-swung  sweep  against  his  cheek  like  a  pet 
kitten.  He  was  deeply  introspective,  and  seemed  to 
be  brooding  over  something.  It  was  not  until  the  next 
morning  that  he  admitted  that  the  raft  had  not  proved 
quite  as  handy  as  he  had  calculated. 

Again  we  ran  well  into  the  dark,  but  this  time  in  a 
somewhat  opener  canyon  than  the  black  gorge  we  had 
threaded  the  night  before.  It  was  Spring  Canyon 
we  were  making  for,  where  Ike  had  left  his  last  raft. 
No  one  was  living  there,  he  said,  but  it  was  a  conven- 
ient place  for  the  ranchers  from  up  on  the  plateau  to 
come  and  get  the  wood.  Earl  found  the  place  and 
made  the  landing  with  not  even  a  window-light  to 
guide.  We  moored  to  the  lower  logs  of  the  cedar 
raft,  most  of  which  was  now  lying  high  and  dry  on 
the  rocks,  left  by  the  falling  river.  We  cooked  sup- 
per on  the  bank  and — after  Roos  had  deftly  picked 
the  lock  with  a  bent  wire — slept  on  the  floor  of  an 
abandoned  farmhouse  on  the  bench  above. 

Ike  had  complained  a  good  deal  of  his  gasoline- 
burned  back  during  the  day,  and  was  evidently  suf- 
fering not  a  little  discomfort  from  the  chafing  of  his 
woollen  undershirt.  He  was  restless  during  the  night, 
and  when  he  got  up  at  daybreak  I  saw  him  pick  up 
and  shake  out  an  old  white  table-cloth  that  had  been 
thrown  in  one  corner.  When  I  went  down  to  the  raft 
a  little  later,  I  found  the  old  rat  stripped  to  the  waist 
and  Earl  engaged  in  swathing  the  burned  back  in  the 
folds  of  the  white  table-cloth.    As  the  resultant  bundle 


266  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

was  rather  too  bulky  to  allow  a  shirt  to  be  drawn  over 
it,  Ike  went  around  for  a  couple  of  hours  just  as  he 
was,  for  all  the  world  like  "the  noblest  Roman  of  them 
all" — from  neck  to  the  waist,  that  is.  The  long,  droop- 
ing, tobacco-stained  moustaches,  no  less  than  the  sag- 
ging overalls,  would  have  had  rather  a  "foreign"  look 
on  the  Forum  Romanum, 


CHAPTER  XI 

BY  LAUNCH  THROUGH  BOX  CANYON 

There  was  plainly  something  on  Ike's  mind  all 
through  breakfast,  but  what  it  was  didn't  transpire 
until  I  asked  him  what  time  he  would  be  ready  to  push 
off.  Then,  like  a  man  who  blurts  out  an  unpalatable 
truth,  he  gave  the  free  end  of  his  "toga"  a  fling  back 
over  his  shoulder  and  announced  that  he  had  come  to 
the  conclusion  that  the  raft  was  too  big  and  too  loosely 
constructed  to  run  Box  Canyon;  in  fact,  we  could 
count  ourselves  lucky  that  we  got  through  Hell  Gate 
without  smasliing  up.  What  he  proposed  to  do  was  to 
take  the  biggest  and  straightest  logs  from  both  the 
rafts  and  make  a  small,  solid  one  that  would  stand  any 
amount  of  banging  from  the  rocks.  He  never  gave 
a  thought  to  his  life  when  working  on  the  river,  he 
declared,  but  it  would  be  a  shame  to  run  an  almost 
certain  risk  of  losing  so  big  a  lot  of  logs  and  cord- 
wood.  The  wreckage  would  be  sure  to  be  salvaged 
by  farmers  who  would  otherwise  have  to  buy  wood 
from  him,  so  he  would  be  a  double  loser  in  case  the 
raft  went  to  pieces.  I  told  him  that  I  quite  appreci- 
ated his  feelings  (about  the  wood  and  logs,  I  mean), 
and  asked  how  long  he  figured  it  would  take  to  get 
the  logs  out  of  the  old  rafts  and  build  a  new  one.  He 
reckoned  it  could  be  done  in  two  or  three  days,  if  we 
hustled.    As  I  had  already  learned  that  any  of  Ike's 

267 


268  DOWN  THE  COLUJMBIA 

estimates  of  time  had  to  be  multiplied  by  at  least  two 
to  approximate  accuracy,  I  realized  at  once  that  our 
rafting  voyage  was  at  an  end.  We  already  had  some 
very  good  raft  pictures,  and  as  a  few  hundred  yards 
of  the  run  through  Box  Canyon  would  be  all  that 
could  be  added  to  these,  it  did  not  seem  worth  any- 
thing like  the  delay  building  the  new  raft  would  im- 
pose. As  far  as  the  sale  of  the  wood  and  logs  was 
concerned,  Ike  said  he  would  rather  have  the  stuff 
where  it  was  than  in  Bridgeport. 

So,  quite  unexpectedly  but  in  all  good  feeling,  we 
prepared  to  abandon  the  raft  and  have  the  motor- 
boat  take  the  skiff  in  tow  as  far  as  Chelan.  This 
would  make  up  a  part  of  the  time  we  had  lost  in  wait- 
ing for  the  raft  in  the  first  place,  and  also  save  the 
portage  round  Box  Canyon.  It  was  quite  out  of  the 
question  venturing  into  that  gorge  in  our  small  boat, 
Earl  said,  but  he  had  made  it  before  with  his  launch, 
and  reckoned  he  could  do  it  again.  We  settled  with 
Ike  on  a  basis  of  twenty  dollars  a  day  for  his  time,  out 
of  which  he  would  pay  for  the  launch.  As  his  big 
raft  of  logs  and  firewood  was  brought  to  its  destina- 
tion for  nothing  by  this  arrangement,  he  was  that 
much  ahead.  For  the  further  use  of  the  launch,  we 
were  to  pay  Earl  ten  dollars  a  day  and  buy  the  gas- 
oline. 

We  helped  Ike  get  the  raft  securely  moored,  had 
an  early  lunch  on  the  rocks,  and  pushed  off  at  a  little 
after  noon,  the  skiff  in  tow  of  the  launch  on  a  short 
painter.  A  few  miles  along  Ike  pointed  out  a  depres- 
sion, high  above  the  river  on  the  left  side,  which  he 
said  was  the  mouth  of  the  Grand  Coulee,  the  ancient 
bed  of  the  Columbia.     I  have  already  mentioned  a 


LAUNCH  THROUGH  BOX  CANYON  269 

project  which  contemplates  bringing  water  from  the 
Pend  d'Oreille  to  irrigate  nearly  two  million  acres  of 
semi-arid  land  of  the  Columbia  basin.  A  project 
that  some  engineers  consider  will  bring  water  to  the 
same  land  more  directly  and  at  a  much  less  cost  per 
acre  is  to  build  a  dam  all  the  way  across  the  Columbia 
below  the  mouth  of  the  Grand  Coulee,  and  use  the 
power  thus  available  to  pump  sixteen  thousand  sec- 
ond-feet into  the  old  channel  of  that  river.  Mr.  James 
O 'Sullivan,  a  contractor  of  Port  Huron,  Michigan, 
who  has  made  an  exhaustive  study  of  this  latter  proj- 
ect, writes  me  as  follows: 

"A  dam  at  this  point  could  be  built  300  feet  high  above 
low  water,  and  it  would  form  a  lake  150  miles  long  all  the 
way  to  the  Canadian  boundary.  It  is  estimated  that  one 
million  dollars  would  pay  all  the  flooding  damages.  A  dam 
300  feet  high  would  be  4,300  feet  long  on  the  crest,  and 
would  require  about  5,000,000  cubic  yards  of  concrete.  It 
would  cost,  assuming  bedrock  not  to  exceed  100  feet  below 
water,  about  forty  million  dollars.  It  is  estimated  that  the 
power-house,  direct  connected  pumps,  turbines  and  discharge 
pipes  would  cost  fifteen  million  dollars.  .  .  .  From  the 
Columbia  River  to  the  arid  lands,  a  distance  of  less  than 
forty  miles,  there  is  a  natural  channel  less  than  one  mile  wide, 
flanked  by  rock  walls  on  both  sides,  so  that  the  cost  of  get- 
ting water  to  the  land  would  be  primarily  confined  to  the  dam 
and  power.  Such  a  dam  would  require  about  five  years  to 
build,  and  it  would  create  out  of  a  worthless  desert  a  na- 
tional estate  of  four  hundred  and  fifty  million  dollars,  and 
the  land  would  produce  annually  in  crops  two  hundred  and 
seventy-five  million.  .  .  .  An  irrigation  district  is  now 
being  formed  in  Central  Washington,  and  it  is  proposed  to 
proceed  at  once  with  the  core  drilling  of  the  dam-site,  to 


270  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

determine  the  nature  and  depth  of  bedrock,  which  seems  to 
be  the  only  question  left  unsettled  which  affects  the  feasi- 
bility of  the  project.  The  Northwestern  states  are  all  in  a 
league  for  securing  the  reclamation  of  this  vast  area,  and 
there  is  no  doubt  that,  if  bedrock  conditions  prove  to  be 
favourable,  that  in  the  near  future  the  money  will  be  raised  to 
construct  this  great  project,  which  will  reclaim  an  area 
equal  to  the  combined  irrigation  projects  undertaken  by  the 
U.  S.  Government  to-day.  ...  It  is  considered  now  that 
where  power  is  free,  a  pumping  lift  as  high  as  300  feet  is 
perfectly  feasible." 

Which  of  these  two  great  projects  for  the  recla- 
mation of  the  desert  of  the  Columbia  Basin  has  the 
most  to  recommend  is  not  a  question  upon  which  a 
mere  river  voyageur,  who  is  not  an  engineer,  can  offer 
an  intelligent  opinion.  That  the  possibilities  of  such 
reclamation,  if  it  can  be  economically  effected,  are 
incalculably  immense,  however,  has  been  amply  dem- 
onstrated. From  source  to  mouth,  the  Columbia  to- 
day is  almost  useless  for  power,  irrigation  and  even 
transportation.  The  experience  of  those  who,  lured 
on  by  abnormal  rainfalls  of  a  decade  or  more  ago, 
tried  dry  farming  in  this  region  border  closely  on  the 
tragic.  And  the  tragedy  has  been  all  the  more  poig- 
nant from  the  fact  that  the  disaster  of  drought  has 
overtaken  them  year  after  year  with  the  Columbia 
running  half  a  million  second-feet  of  water  to  waste 
right  before  their  eyes.  I  subsequently  met  a  rancher 
in  Wenatchee  who  said  the  only  good  the  Columbia 
ever  was  to  a  man  who  tried  to  farm  along  it  in  the 
dry  belt  was  as  a  place  to  drown  himself  in  when  he 
went  broke. 


■^<s^ 


'^^    £^. 


THE  SUSPENSION  BRIDGE  AT  CHELAN   FALLS    (above) 

OLD    RIVER    VETERANS    ON    THE    LANDING    AT    POTARIS.     (CAPT. 
MCDERMID  ON  LEFT,  IKE  EMERSON  ON  RIGHT)    (below) 


NIGHT  WAS  FALLING  AS  WE  HEADED  INTO  BOX  CANYON    Kahove) 
THE   COLUMBIA  ABOVE  BOX   CANYON    (  below) 


LAUNCH  THROUGH  BOX  CANYON  271 

The  rock-littered  channel  of  Moneghan's  or  Buck- 
ley's Rapids  was  easily  threaded  by  the  launch,  and 
Equilibrium  or  "Jumbo"  Rapids,  three  miles  lower 
down,  did  not  prove  a  serious  obstruction.  The  offi- 
cial name  is  the  former,  and  was  given  the  riffle  by 
Symons  on  account  of  a  round-topped  rock  which 
rolled  back  and  forth  in  the  current  because  of  its 
unstable  equilibrium.  The  local  name  of  "Jumbo" 
derives  from  the  fact  that  this  same  rolling  rock  has 
something  of  the  appearance  of  an  elephant,  when 
viewed  from  a  certain  angle.  Ten  miles  more  of  deep, 
evenly-flowing  water  brought  us  to  Mah-kin  Rapids 
and  the  head  of  Nespilem  Canyon.  The  next  twenty- 
four  miles,  terminating  at  the  foot  of  what  is  officially 
called  Kalichen  Falls  and  Whirlpool  (Box  Canyon 
in  local  nomenclature),  is  the  fastest  stretch  of  equal 
length  on  the  Columbia  except  on  the  Big  Bend  in 
Canada.  It  is  one  continuous  succession  of  rapids, 
eddies  and  whirlpools  all  the  way,  and  the  much  feared 
Box  Canyon  is  a  fitting  finale.  I  was  distinctly  glad 
to  be  running  through  in  a  motor-boat  rather  than 
the  skiff.  As  to  the  raft,  I  never  have  been  able  to 
make  up  my  mind  as  to  just  how  she  would  have 
fared. 

The  roar  of  the  savage  half-mile  tumble  of  Mah- 
kin  Rapids  was  a  fitting  overture  to  the  main  per- 
formance. The  river  narrows  down  sharply  between 
precipitous  banks,  and  most  of  the  rocks  from  the 
surrounding  hills  seem  to  have  rolled  into  the  middle 
of  the  channel.  There  was  an  awful  mess  of  churned 
water  even  where  the  river  was  deepest,  and  I 
wouldn't  have  been  quite  comfortable  heading  into  it 


272  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

even  in  the  launch.  Earl  seemed  rather  of  the  same 
mind,  too,  for  he  kej^t  edging  out  to  the  right  every 
time  one  of  the  big  combers  lurched  over  at  him. 
With  the  engine  running  like  a  top,  he  kept  her  in 
comparatively  good  water  all  the  way  through.  It 
was  a  striking  lesson  in  the  value  of  power  in  running 
a  rapid — as  long  as  the  power  doesn't  fail  you. 

Rock-peppered  rapids  followed  each  other  every 
mile  or  two  from  the  foot  of  Mah-kin,  but — thanks 
to  Earl's  nose  for  the  best  channel — we  were  not  tak- 
ing more  than  an  occasional  shower  of  spray  over  the 
bows  where  the  water  was  whitest.  It  was  not  too 
rough  for  reading,  and,  anxious  to  prepare  Roos  for 
what  he  was  about  to  experience  at  Kalichen  Falls 
and  Collision  Rock,  I  dug  out  Symons'  report  and 
ran  rapidly  through  the  dramatic  description  of  how 
his  party  fared  in  running  the  sinister  gorge  ahead. 
It  seems  to  me  rather  a  classic  of  its  kind,  and  I  am 
setting  it  down  in  full,  just  as  I  read  it  to  Roos  and 
Ike  that  afternoon  in  the  cockpit  of  the  launch.  I 
only  wish  I  could  complete  the  effect  with  the  diorama 
of  the  flying  canyon  walls,  the  swirling  waters  of  the 
river,  and  the  obligato  in  duet  by  the  roaring  rapids 
and  the  sharply  hitting  engine. 

"The  shores  of  Nespilcm  Canyon  arc  strewn  with  huge 
masses  of  black  basaltic  rock  of  all  sizes  and  shapes,  and 
this  continues  for  several  miles,  forming  a  characteristic 
picture  of  Columbia  River  scenery.  The  complete  .  .  . 
lifelessness  of  the  scene  makes  it  seem  exceedingly  wikl,  almost 
unearthly.  And  so  we  plunge  along  swiftly  through  the 
rolling  water,  with  huge  rocks  looming  up,  now  on  one  side 
and  now  on  the  other.     Every  stroke  of  the  oar  is  bearing 


LAUNCH  THROUGH  BOX  CANYON  273 

us  onward,  nearer  and  nearer,  to  that  portion  of  our  voyage 
most  dreaded,  the  terrible  Kalichen  Falls  and  Whirlpool  Rap- 
ids. We  hear  the  low  rumbling  of  the  water,  and  see  the 
tops  of  the  huge  half-sunken  rocks  and  the  white  foam  of 
the  tumbling  waters.  For  a  few  moments  the  rowing  ceases, 
while  brave  old  Pierre  gives  his  orders  to  the  Indians  in 
their  own  tongue.  He  knows  that  everything  depends  upon 
his  steering  and  their  rowing  or  backing  at  the  right  moment, 
with  all  the  strength  they  possess.  Years  ago  he  was  in  a 
Hudson  Bay  Company  batteau  which  capsized  in  these  very 
rapids,  and  out  of  a  crew  of  sixteen  men  eight  perished  in 
the  water  or  on  the  rocks. 

"The  Indians  make  their  preparations  for  the  struggle  by 
stripping  off  all  their  superfluous  clothing,  removing  their 
gloves,  and  each  ties  a  bright-coloured  handkerchief  tightly 
about  his  head;  poles  and  extra  oars  are  laid  ready  in  con- 
venient places  to  reach  should  they  become  necessary,  and 
then  with  a  shout  the  Indians  seize  their  oars  and  commence 
laying  to  them  with  all  their  strength.  We  are  rushing 
forward  at  a  fearful  rate,  owing  to  the  combined  exertions 
of  the  Indians  and  the  racing  current,  and  we  shudder  at  the 
thought  of  striking  any  of  the  huge  black  rocks  near  which 
we  glide.  Now  we  are  fairly  in  the  rapids,  and  our  boat  is 
rushing  madly  through  the  foam  and  billows ;  the  Indians 
are  shouting  at  every  stroke  in  their  wild,  savage  glee ;  it  is 
infectious ;  we  shout  too,  and  feel  the  wild  exultation  which 
comes  to  men  in  moments  of  great  excitement  and  danger. 
Ugly  masses  of  rocks  show  their  heads  above  the  troubled 
waters  on  every  side,  and  sunken  rocks  are  discernible  by 
the  action  of  the  surf.  Great  billows  strike  us  fore  and  aft, 
some  falling  squarely  over  the  bows  and  drenching  us  to  the 
waist.  This  is  bad  enough,  but  the  worst  is  yet  to  come  as 
we  draw  near  with  great  velocity  to  a  huge  rock  which  ap- 
pears dead  ahead. 


274  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

"Has  old  Pierre  seen  it?  The  water  looks  terribly  cold 
as  we  think  of  his  failing  eyesight.  Then  an  order,  a  shout, 
backing  on  one  side  and  pulling  on  the  other,  and  a  quick 
stroke  of  the  steering  oar,  and  the  rock  appears  on  our 
right  hand.  Another  command,  and  answering  shout,  and  the 
oars  bend  like  willows  as  the  Indians  struggle  to  get  the 
boat  out  of  the  strong  eddy  into  which  Pierre  had  thrown 
her.  Finally  she  shoots  ahead  and  passes  the  rock  like  a 
flash,  within  less  than  an  oar's  length  of  it,  and  we  shout  for 
joy  and  breathe  freely  again.    .    .    . 

"For  half  a  mile  the  river  is  comparatively  good,  and  our 
staunch  crew  rest  on  their  oars  preparatory  to  the  next 
struggle,  which  soon  comes,  as  some  more  rocky,  foamy 
rapids  are  reached.  Here  the  swells  are  very  high  and  grand, 
and  our  boat  at  one  time  seems  to  stand  almost  perpendicu- 
larly." ("Them's  Eagle  Rapids,"  Ike  interrupted;  "sloppier 
'n  'ell,  but  straight.") 

"For  about  nine  miles  further  the  river  continues  studded 
with  rocks  and  swift,  with  ripples  every  mile  or  so,  until 
we  reach  Foster  Creek  Rapids.  Here  the  rocks  become 
thicker  .  .  .  and  the  water  fierce  and  wild.  For  a  mile 
more  we  plunge  and  toss  through  the  foaming,  roaring 
water,  amid  wild  yells  from  our  Indian  friends,  and  we 
emerge  from  Foster  Creek  Rapids,  which  appear  to  be  as 
rough  and  dangerous  a  place  as  any  we  have  yet  encountered. 
We  are  now  out  of  Nespilem  Canyon  and  through  all 
the  Nespilem  Rapids,  and  we  certainly  feel  greatly  re- 
lieved.   ..." 

Ike,  renewing  his  quid,  observed  that  they  didn't 
call  it  Nespilem  Canyon  any  more,  for  the  reason  that 
that  sounded  too  much  like  "Let's  spill  'em!"  and 
there  was  enough  chance  of  that  without  asking  for 
it.    Roos,  in  bravado,  asked  Ike  if  he  was  going  to 


LAUNCH  THROUGH  BOX  CANYON  275 

strip  down  like  Symons'  Indians  did.  The  old  Roman 
replied  by  pulling  on  a  heavy  mackinaw  over  his 
"toga,"  saying  that  he'd  rather  have  warmth  than 
action  once  he  was  out  in  the  "Columby."  That  led 
me  to  ask  him — with  a  touch  of  bravado  on  my  own 
account — how  long  it  would  take  him  to  "submarine" 
from  Box  Canyon  to  Kettle  Falls.  He  grinned  a  bit 
sourly  at  that,  and  started  slacking  the  lashings  on 
the  sweeps  and  pike-poles.  Roos  was  just  tying  a 
red  handkerchief  round  his  head  when  Earl  beckoned 
him  forward  to  take  the  wheel  while  he  gave  the  en- 
gine a  final  hurried  tuning.  Ike,  saying  that  we  would 
be  hitting  "White  Cap"  just  round  the  next  bend, 
gave  me  brief  but  pointed  instructions  in  the  use  of 
sweep  and  pike-pole  in  case  the  engine  went  wrong. 
He  had  spat  forth  his  quid  again,  just  as  at  Hell  Gate, 
and  his  unmuffled  voice  had  a  strange  and  penetrat- 
ing timbre. 

White  Cap  Rapids  are  well  named.  Two  rocky 
points  converge  at  the  head  and  force  all  the  con- 
flicting currents  of  the  river  into  a  straight,  steep 
channel,  heavily  littered  with  boulders  and  fanged 
with  outcropping  bedrock.  In  that  currents  from 
opposite  sides  of  the  river  are  thrown  together  in  one 
mad  tumble  of  wallowing  waters,  it  is  much  Hke  Gor- 
don Rapids,  on  the  Big  Bend.  If  anything,  it  is  the 
rougher  of  the  two,  making  up  in  volume  what  it 
lacks  in  drop.  It  is  a  rapid  that  would  be  particularly 
mean  for  a  small  boat,  from  the  fact  that  there  would 
be  no  way  of  keeping  out  of  the  middle  of  it,  and  that 
is  a  wet  place — very.  The  launch  had  the  power  to 
hold  a  course  just  on  the  outer  right  edge  of  the  rough 


276  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

water,  and  so  made  a  fairly  comfortable  passage  of  it. 

With  the  "intake"  above  Kalichen  Falls  full  in 
view  a  half  mile  distant,  Earl  went  back  to  his  engine 
as  we  shot  out  at  the  foot  of  "White  Cap"  and  gave 
it  a  few  little  "jiggering"  caresses — much  as  a  rider 
pats  the  neck  of  his  hunter  as  he  comes  to  a  jump — ■ 
before  the  final  test.  Then  he  covered  it  carefully 
with  a  double  canvas  and  went  back  to  the  wheel. 
Roos  he  kept  forward,  standing-by  to  take  the  wheel 
or  tinker  the  engine  in  case  of  emergency.  The  lad, 
though  quite  without  "river  sense,"  was  a  first-class 
mechanic  and  fairly  dependable  at  the  steering  wheel 
providing  he  was  told  what  to  do. 

The  sounding  board  of  the  rocky  walls  gave  a  deep 
pulsating  resonance  to  the  heavy  roar  ahead,  but  it 
was  not  until  we  dipped  over  the  "intake"  that  the 
full  volume  of  it  assailed  us.  Then  it  came  with  a 
rush,  a  palpable  avalanche  of  sound  that  impacted  on 
the  ear-drums  with  the  raw,  grinding  roar  of  a  pass- 
ing freight  train.  It  was  not  from  the  huge  rollers  the 
launch  was  skirting  so  smartly  that  this  tearing,  rend- 
ing roar  came,  but  from  an  enormous  black  rock 
almost  dead  ahead.  It  was  trying  to  do  the  same 
thing  that  big  island  in  the  middle  of  Hell  Gate  had 
tried  to  do,  and  was  succeeding  rather  better.  The 
latter  had  been  able  to  do  no  more  than  split  the  river 
down  the  middle;  this  one  was  forcing  the  whole 
stream  to  do  a  side-step,  and  pretty  nearly  a  somer- 
sault— hence  Kalichen  Falls  and  Whirlpool.  Col- 
lision Rock  was  distinctly  impressive,  even  from  a 
launch. 

The  sun  was  just  dipping  behind  the  southern  wall 


LAUNCH  THROUGH  BOX  CANYON  277 

of  Box  Canyon  (how  funky  I  became  later,  when  I 
was  alone,  about  going  into  a  rapid  in  that  slanting, 
deceptive  evening  light!)  as  the  launch  hit  the  rough 
water.  There  was  dancing  iridescence  in  the  flung 
foam-spurts  above  the  combers,  and  at  the  right  of 
Colhsion  Rock  the  beginning  of  a  rainbow  which  I 
knew  would  grow  almost  to  a  full  circle  when  we 
looked  back  from  below  the  fall.  I  snapped  once  with 
my  kodak  into  the  reehng  tops  of  the  waves  that 
raced  beside  us,  and  then  started  to  wind  up  to  have  a 
fresh  film  for  the  rock  and  the  crowning  rainbow. 
That  highly  artistic  exposure  was  never  made. 

Earl,  instead  of  shutting  off  his  engine  as  he  did 
in  running  Spokane  Rapids,  opened  up  all  the  wider 
as  he  neared  the  barrier  and  its  refluent  wave.  This 
was  because  the  danger  of  striking  submerged  rocks 
was  less  than  that  of  butting  into  that  one  outcrop 
of  ragged  reef  that  was  coming  so  near  to  throwing 
the  river  over  on  its  back.  If  the  launch  was  to  avoid 
telescoping  on  Collision  Rock  as  the  Columbia  was 
doing,  it  must  get  enough  way  on  to  shoot  across  the 
current  into  the  eddy  on  the  left.  That  was  what 
Earl  was  preparing  for  when  he  opened  up  the  engine. 
With  both  boat  and  current  doing  well  over  twenty 
miles  an  hour,  we  were  literally  rushing  down  at  the 
rocky  barrier  with  the  speed  of  an  express  train  when 
Earl  spun  the  wheel  hard  over  and  drove  her  sharply 
to  the  left.    That  was  when  I  stopped  kodaking. 

In  spite  of  the  rough  water,  the  launch  had  been  re- 
markably dry  until  her  course  was  altered.  Then  she 
made  up  for  lost  time.  The  next  ten  or  fifteen  sec- 
onds was  an  unbroken  deluge.    With  a  great  up-toss 


278  DOWN  THE  COLU^NIBIA 

of  wake,  she  heeled  all  of  forty-five  degrees  to  star- 
hoard  at  the  turn,  seeing  which,  the  river  forthwith 
hegan  2:)iling  over  her  port  or  up-stream  side  and  mak- 
ing an  astonishingly  single-minded  attempt  to  push 
her  on  the  rest  of  the  way  under.  Faihng  in  that  (for 
her  drauglit  was  too  great  and  her  engine  set  too  low 
to  make  her  easily  capsizable),  the  river  tried  to  ac- 
complish the  same  end  by  swamping  her.  Fore  and 
aft  the  water  came  pouring  over  in  a  solid  green  flood, 
and  kept  right  on  pouring  until  Earl,  having  driven 
through  to  the  point  he  wanted,  turned  her  head  down 
stream  again  and  let  lier  right  herself. 

The  water  was  swishing  about  my  knees  for  a  few 
moments  in  the  cockpit,  and  it  must  have  been  worse 
than  that  forward.  Then  it  drained  down  into  the 
bilge  without,  apparently,  greatly  affecting  her  buoy- 
ancy. The  higher-keyed  staccato  of  the  engine  cut 
sharply  through  the  heavier  roar  of  the  falls.  It  was 
still  popping  like  a  machine-gun,  without  a  break. 
Reassured  by  that  welcome  sound.  Earl  orientated 
quickly  as  he  shook  the  water  from  his  eyes,  and  then 
put  her  full  at  the  head  of  the  falls.  Just  how  much 
of  a  pitch  there  was  at  this  stage  of  water  I  couldn't 
quite  make  out.  Nothing  in  comparison  with  the  cat- 
aract there  at  high  water  (when  the  river  rushes  right 
over  the  top  of  Collision  Rock)  certainly;  and  yet  it 
was  a  dizzy  bit  of  a  drop,  with  rather  too  deliberate 
a  recovery  to  leave  one  quite  comfortable.  For  a  few 
seconds  the  launch's  head  was  deeply  buried  in  the 
soft  stuff  of  the  souse-hole  into  wliich  she  took  her 
header;  the  next  her  bows  were  high  in  the  air  as  the 
up-boil  caught  her.    Then  her  propellers  began  strik- 


LAUNCH  THROUGH  BOX  CANYON  279 

ing  into  something  solider  than  air-charged  suds,  and 
she  shot  jerkily  away  in  a  current  so  torn  with  swirls 
that  it  looked  like  a  great  length  of  twisted  green-and- 
white  rope.  We  had  missed  Collision  Rock  by  thirty 
feet,  and  given  the  dreaded  whirlpool  behind  it  an 
even  wider  berth. 

The  next  thirteen  miles  we  did  at  a  rate  that  Ike 
figured  must  have  been  about  the  fastest  travelling 
ever  done  on  the  Columbia.  The  current  runs  at 
from  ten  to  twenty  miles  an  hour  all  the  way  from  the 
head  of  Box  Canyon  to  Bridgeport,  and  Earl,  racing 
to  reach  Foster  Creek  Rapids  before  it  was  dark,  ran 
just  about  wide  open  nearly  the  whole  distance.  It 
was  real  train  speed  at  which  we  sped  down  the  dark- 
ening gorge — possibly  over  forty  miles  an  hour  at 
times.  Earl  knew  the  channel  like  a  book,  and  said 
there  was  nothing  to  bother  about  in  the  way  of  rocks 
as  long  as  he  could  see.  We  were  out  of  the  closely- 
walled  part  of  the  canyon  at  Eagle  Rapids,  and  the 
sunset  glow  was  bright  upon  the  water  ahead.  There 
is  a  series  of  short,  steep  riffles  here,  extending  for  a 
mile  and  a  half,  and  Earl  slammed  right  down  the 
lot  of  them  on  the  high.  Ike  was  right  about  their 
being  sloppy,  but  the  beacon  of  the  afterglow  gave 
the  bearing  straight  through.  Two  miles  further  on 
the  river  appeared  suddenly  to  be  filled  with  swim- 
ming hippos — round-topped  black  rocks  just  showing 
above  the  water;  but  each  one  was  silhouetted  against 
a  surface  that  glinted  rose  and  gold,  and  so  was  as 
easy  to  miss  as  in  broad  daylight. 

It  was  all  but  full  night  as  the  roar  of  Foster  Creek 
Rapids  began  to  drown  the  rattle  of  the  engine,  with 


280  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

only  a  luminous  lilac  mist  floating  above  the  south- 
western mountains  to  mark  where  the  sun  had  set; 
but  it  was  enough — just  enough — to  throw  a  glow  of 
pale  amethyst  on  the  frothy  tops  of  the  white-caps, 
leaving  the  untorn  water  to  roll  on  in  fluid  anthra- 
cite. Karl  barely  eased  her  at  the  head,  and  then 
plunged  her  down  a  path  of  polished  ebony,  with  the 
Ijlank  blur  of  rocks  looming  close  on  the  riglit  and  an 
apparitional  line  of  half-guessed  rollers  booming 
boisterously  to  the  left.  For  three-quarters  of  a  mile 
we  raced  that  gliostly  Ku-Klux-Klan  procession,  and 
Roos,  who  was  timing  with  his  radium-faced  watch, 
announced  that  we  had  made  the  distance  in  some- 
thing like  seventy  seconds.  Then  there  was  quieter 
water,  and  presently  the  lights  of  Bridgeport.  Earl 
put  us  off  opposite  the  town,  and  ran  down  a  (piarter 
of  a  mile  farther  to  get  out  of  the  still  swiftly-run- 
ning current  and  berth  the  launch  in  a  quiet  eddy 
below  the  sawmill. 

Bridgeport,  for  a  town  a  score  of  miles  from  the 
railway,  proved  unexpectedly  metropolitan,  with  elec- 
tric lights,  banks,  movie  theatres,  and  a  sign  at  the 
main  crossing  prohibiting  "Left  Hand  Turns."  The 
people,  for  a  country  town,  showed  very  diverting 
evidences  of  sophistication.  At  the  movies  that  night 
(where  we  went  to  get  the  election  returns),  they 
continually  laughed  at  the  vilhiin  and  snickered  at 
the  heroine's  platitudinous  sub-titles;  and  finally, 
when  word  came  that  it  \Yas  Harding  beyond  all 
doubt,  they  forgot  the  picture  completely  and  gave 
their  undivided  attention  to  joshing  the  town's  only 
avowed  Democrat.    The  victim  bore  up  fairly  well  as 


LAUNCH  THROUGH  BOX  CANYON  281 

long  as  his  baiters  stuck  to  "straight  politics,"  but 
when  they  accused  him  of  wearing  an  imitation  leather 
coat  made  of  brown  oil-cloth,  the  shaft  got  under  his 
armour.  With  a  ruddy  blush  that  was  the  plainest 
kind  of  a  confession  of  guilt,  he  pushed  out  to  the 
aisle  and  beat  a  disorderly  retreat. 

A  prosperous  apple  farmer  sitting  next  me  (he 
had  been  telling  me  what  his  crop  would  bring  the 
while  the  naturally  vamp-faced  heroine  was  trying 
to  register  pup-innocence  and  "gold-cannot-buy-me" 
as  the  villain  was  choking  her)  sniffed  contemptuously 
as  the  discomfited  Democrat  disappeared  through  the 
swinging  doors.  "Seems  to  feel  worse  about  being 
caught  with  an  imitation  coat  than  about  being  an 
imitation  politician.  Better  send  him  to  Congress!" 
Now  wasn't  that  good  for  a  small  town  that  didn't 
even  have  a  railroad  ?  I've  known  men  of  cities  of  all 
of  a  hundred  thousand,  with  street  cars,  municipal 
baths,  Carnegie  libraries  and  women's  clubs,  who 
hadn't  the  measure  of  Congress  as  accurately  as  that. 
I  wish  there  had  been  time  to  see  more  of  Bridgeport. 

It  was  down  to  twelve  above  when  we  turned  out 
in  the  morning,  with  the  clear  air  tingling  with  frost 
particles  and  incipient  ice-fringes  around  the  eddies. 
Fortunately,  Earl  had  bailed  both  boats  the  night  be- 
fore and  drained  his  engine.  Just  below  Bridgeport 
the  river,  which  had  been  running  almost  due  west 
from  the  mouth  of  the  Spokane  River,  turned  off  to 
the  north.  In  a  slackening  current  we  approached 
the  small  patch  of  open  country  at  the  mouth  of  the 
Okinagan.  The  latter,  which  heads  above  the  lake 
of  the  same  name  in  British  Columbia,  appears  an 


282  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

insignificant  stream  as  viewed  from  the  Columbia,  and 
one  would  never  suspect  that  it  is  navigable  for  good- 
sized  stern- wheelers  for  a  considerable  distance  above 
its  mouth.  On  the  right  bank  of  the  Columbia,  just 
above  the  mouth  of  the  Okinagan,  is  the  site  of  wha-t 
was  perhaps  the  most  important  of  the  original  Astor 
posts  of  the  interior.  As  a  sequel  to  the  war  of  1812 
it  was  turned  over  to  the  Northwest  Company,  and 
ultimately  passed  under  the  control  of  Hudson  Bay. 
I  could  see  nothing  but  a  barren  flat  at  this  point 
where  so  much  history  was  made,  but  a  splendid  apple 
orchard  occupies  most  of  the  fertile  bench  in  the  loop 
of  the  bend  on  the  opposite  bank. 

The  mouth  of  the  Okinagan  marks  the  most  north- 
erly point  of  the  Washington  Big  Bend  of  the  Co- 
lumbia. From  there  it  flows  southwesterly  for  a  few 
miles  to  the  mouth  of  the  Methow,  before  turning  al- 
most directly  south.  We  passed  Brewster  without 
landing,  but  pulled  up  alongside  a  big  stern-wheeler 
moored  against  the  bank  at  Potaris,  just  above  the 
swift-running  Methow  Rapids.  It  was  the  Bridge- 
port, and  Ike  had  spoken  of  her  skipper,  whom  he 
called  "Old  Cap,"  many  times  and  with  the  greatest 
affection.  "Old  Cap"  proved  to  be  the  Captain  Mc- 
Dermid,  who  had  run  the  Shoshone  down  through 
Grand  Rapids,  and  who  was  rated  as  the  nerviest 
steamer  skipper  left  on  the  Columbia. 

Captain  ]\IcDermid  was  waiting  on  the  bow  of  his 
steamer  to  give  us  a  hand  aboard.  He  had  read  of 
our  voyage  in  the  Spokane  papers,  he  said,  and  had 
been  on  the  lookout  for  several  days.  At  first  he  had 
watched  for  a  skiff,  but  later,  when  he  had  heard  that 


LAUNCH  THROUGH  BOX  CANYON  283 

we  had  pushed  off  with  Ike  on  a  raft,  it  was  logs  he 
had  been  keeping  a  weather  eye  lifting  for.  When 
Ike  described  the  raft  to  him,  he  wagged  his  head 
significantly,  and  said  he  reckoned  it  was  just  as  well 
we  had  changed  to  the  launch  for  Box  Canyon.  "It 
isn't  everybody  that  can  navigate  under  water  like 
this  old  rat  here,"  he  added,  giving  Ike  a  playful  prod 
in  the  ribs. 

As  we  were  planning  to  go  on  through  to  the  mouth 
of  the  Chelan  River,  in  the  hope  of  getting  up  to  the 
lake  that  afternoon,  an  hour  was  the  most  I  could 
stop  over  on  the  Bridgeport  for  a  yarn  with  Cap- 
tain McDermid,  where  I  would  have  been  glad  of  a 
week.  He  told  me,  very  simply  but  graphically,  of 
the  run  down  Grand  Rapids,  and  a  little  of  his  work 
with  stern  or  side-wheelers  in  other  parts  of  the  world, 
which  included  a  year  on  the  upper  Amazon  and  about 
the  same  time  as  skipper  of  a  ferry  running  from  the 
Battery  to  Staten  Island.  Then  he  spoke,  with  a 
shade  of  sadness,  of  the  Bridgeport  and  his  plans 
for  the  future.  In  all  the  thousand  miles  of  the  Co- 
lumbia between  the  Dalles  and  its  source,  she  had 
been  the  last  steamer  to  maintain  a  regular  service. 
(This  was  not  reckoning  the  Arrow  Lakes,  of  course) . 
But  the  close  of  the  present  apple  season  had  marked 
the  end.  Between  the  increasing  competition  of  rail- 
ways and  trucks,  the  game  was  no  longer  worth  the 
candle.  He,  and  his  partners  in  the  Bridgeport, 
had  decided  to  try  to  take  her  to  Portland  and  offer 
her  for  sale.  She  was  very  powerfully  engined  and 
would  undoubtedly  bring  a  good  price — once  they 
got  her  there.    But  getting  her  to  Portland  was  the 


284  DOAVN  THE  COLUMBIA 

rub.  There  were  locks  at  the  Cascades  and  the  Dal- 
les, but  Rock  Island,  Cabinet,  Priest  and  Umatilla, 
to  say  nothing  of  a  number  of  lesser  rapids  would 
have  to  be  run.  It  was  a  big  gamble,  insurance,  of 
course,  being  out  of  the  question  on  any  terms.  The 
Douglas,  half  the  size  of  the  Bridgeport,  had 
tried  it  a  couple  of  months  ago,  and — well,  we  would 
see  the  consequences  on  the  rocks  below  Cabinet  Rap- 
ids. Got  through  Rock  Island  all  right,  and  then 
went  wrong  in  Cabinet,  which  wasn't  half  as  bad. 
Overconfidence,  probably,  "Old  Cap"  thought.  But 
he  felt  sure  that  he  would  have  better  luck,  especially 
if  he  went  down  first  and  made  a  good  study  of  Rock 
Island  and  Priest;  and  that  was  one  of  the  things 
that  he  had  wanted  to  see  me  about.  If  there  was 
room  for  him  in  the  skiff,  he  would  like  to  run  through 
with  us  as  far  as  Pasco,  and  brush  up  on  the  channel 
as  we  went  along.  If  things  were  so  he  could  get 
away,  he  would  join  us  at  Wenatchee  on  our  return 
from  Chelan.  I  jumped  at  the  chance  without  hesi- 
tation, for  it  would  give  us  the  benefit  of  the  expe- 
rience and  help  of  the  very  best  man  on  that  part  of 
the  Columbia  in  getting  through  the  worst  of  the 
rapids  that  remained  to  be  run.  I  had  been  a  good 
deal  concerned  about  how  the  sinister  cascade  of  Rock 
Island  was  to  be  negotiated,  to  say  nothing  of  the 
long  series  of  riffles  called  Priest  Rapids,  which  had 
even  a  worse  record.  I  parted  with  Captain  McDer- 
mid  with  the  understanding  that  we  would  get  in 
touch  by  plione  a  day  or  two  later,  when  I  knew  defi- 
nitely when  we  would  return  to  the  river  from  Che- 
lan, and  make  the  final  arrangements. 


LAUNCH  THROUGH  BOX  CANYON  285 

Leaving  Ike  on  the  Bridgeport  for  a  yarn  with 
his  old  friend,  we  pushed  off  in  the  launch  for  Chelan. 
Methow  Rapids,  just  below  the  river  of  that  name, 
was  the  only  fast  water  encountered,  and  that  was  a 
good,  straight  run  in  a  fairly  clear  channel.  We 
landed  half  a  mile  below  the  mouth  of  the  Chelan 
River,  where  the  remains  of  a  road  led  down  through 
the  boulders  to  the  tower  of  an  abandoned  ferry.  Earl 
put  about  at  once  and  headed  back  up-stream,  expect- 
ing to  pick  up  Ike  at  Potaris  and  push  on  through  to 
Bridgeport  that  evening. 

We  parted  from  both  Earl  and  Ike  in  all  good 
feeling  and  with  much  regret.  Each  in  his  line  was 
one  of  the  best  men  I  have  ever  had  to  do  with.  Ike — 
in  spite  of  the  extent  to  which  his  movements  were 
dominated  by  the  maxim  that  "time  is  made  for 
slaves,"  or,  more  likely,  for  that  very  reason — was  a 
most  priceless  character.  I  only  hope  I  shall  be  able 
to  recruit  him  for  another  river  voyage  in  the  not-too- 
distant  future. 


CHAPTER  XII 


CHELAN    TO    PASCO 


For  two  reasons  I  am  writing  but  briefly  of  our 
visit  to  Lake  Chelan :  first,  because  it  was  entirely  in- 
cidental to  the  Columbia  voyage,  and,  second,  because 
one  who  has  only  made  the  run  up  and  down  this 
loveliest  of  mountain  lakes  has  no  call  to  write  of  it. 
Chelan  is  well  named  "Beautiful  Water."  Sixty 
miles  long  and  from  one  to  four  miles  wide,  cliff- 
walled  and  backed  by  snowy  mountains  and  glaciers, 
it  has  much  in  common  with  the  Arrow  Lakes  of  the 
upper  Columbia,  and,  by  the  same  tokens,  Kootenay 
Lake.  Among  the  large  mountain  lakes  of  the  world 
it  has  few  peers. 

The  Chelan  River  falls  three  hundred  and  eighty- 
five  feet  in  the  four  miles  from  the  outlet  of  the  lake 
to  where  it  tumbles  into  the  Columbia.  It  is  a  foam- 
white  torrent  all  the  way,  with  a  wonderful  "Horse- 
shoe" gorge  near  the  lower  end  which  has  few  rivals 
for  savage  grandeur.  One  may  reach  the  lake  from 
the  Columbia  by  roads  starting  either  north  or  south 
of  the  draining  river.  We  went  by  the  latter,  as  it 
was  the  more  conveniently  reached  from  the  ferry- 
man's house  where  we  had  left  our  outfit  after  land- 
ing. The  town  of  Chelan,  at  the  lower  end  of  the 
lake,  is  a  lovelj^  little  village,  with  clean  streets,  bright 
shops,  and  a  very  comfortable  hotel.  I  have  forgot- 
ten the  name  of  the  hotel,  but  not  the  fact  that  it 
serves  a  big  pitcher  of  thick,  yellow  cream  with  every 

286 


CHELAN  TO  PASCO  287 

breakfast.  So  far  as  my  own  experience  goes,  it  is 
the  only  hotel  in  America  or  Europe  which  has  per- 
petuated that  now  all  but  extinct  ante-bellum  cus- 
tom. In  case  there  may  be  any  interested  to  know — 
even  actually  to  enjoy — what  our  forefathers  had  with 
their  coffee  and  mush,  I  will  state  that  three  transcon- 
tinental railways  pass  within  a  hundred  miles  to  the 
southward  of  Chelan.  It  will  prove  well  worth  the 
stop-over;  and  there  is  the  lake  besides. 

The  lower  end  of  Lake  Chelan  is  surrounded  by 
rolling  hills,  whose  fertile  soil  is  admirably  adapted 
to  apples,  now  an  important  industry  in  that  region; 
the  upper  end  is  closely  walled  with  mountains  and 
high  cliffs — really  an  extremely  deep  gorge  half  filled 
with  water.  Indeed,  the  distinction  of  being  the 
"deepest  furrow  Time  has  wTOught  on  the  face  of  the 
Western  Hemisphere"  is  claimed  for  upper  Chelan 
Lake — this  because  there  are  cliffs  which  rise  almost 
vertically  for  six  thousand  feet  from  the  water's  edge, 
and  at  a  point  where  the  sounding  lead  has  needed 
nearly  a  third  of  that  length  of  line  to  bring  it  back 
from  a  rocky  bottom  which  is  indented  far  below  the 
level  of  the  sea. 

The  head  of  Chelan  is  far  back  in  the  heart  of  the 
Cascades,  in  the  glaciers  of  which  its  feeding  streams 
take  their  rise.  The  main  tributaries  are  Railroad 
Creek,  which  flows  in  from  the  south  about  two-thirds 
of  the  way  up,  and  Stehekin  River,  which  comes  In 
at  the  head.  These  two  streams  are  credited  with 
some  of  the  finest  waterfalls,  gorges  and  cliff  and 
glacier-begirt  mountain  valleys  to  be  found  in  North 
America,  and  it  is  possible  to  see  the  best  of  both  in 


288  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

the  course  of  a  single  "circular"  trip  by  packtrain. 
To  my  great  regret,  it  was  not  practicable  to  get  an 
outfit  together  in  the  limited  time  at  our  disposal. 
The  best  we  could  do  so  late  in  the  season  was  a  hur- 
ried run  up  to  Rainbow  Falls,  a  most  striking  cata- 
ract, three  hundred  and  fifty  feet  in  height,  descend- 
ing over  the  cliffs  of  the  Stehekin  River  four  miles 
above  the  head  of  the  lake.  Roos  made  a  number  of 
scenic  shots  here,  but  on  a  roll  which — whether  in  the 
camera  or  the  laboratory  it  was  impossible  to  deter- 
mine— was  badly  light-struck.  Similar  misfortune 
attended  a  number  of  other  shots  he  made  (through 
the  courtesy  of  the  Captain  of  the  mail  launch  in  run- 
ning near  the  cliffs)  of  waterfalls  tumbling  directly 
into  the  lake.  There  are  many  slips  between  the  cup 
and  the  hp — the  camera  and  the  screen,  I  should  say 
— in  scenic  movie  work. 

We  arrived  back  at  the  town  of  Chelan  in  time  for 
lunch  on  the  sixth  of  November,  and  a  couple  of  hours 
later  were  down  at  the  Columbia  ready  to  push  off 
again.  I  had  been  unable  to  get  in  touch  with  Cap- 
tain McDermid  by  phone,  but  was  confident  that  he 
would  turn  up  in  good  time  at  Wenatchee.  As  there 
was  nothing  between  that  point  and  the  mouth  of  the 
Chelan  in  the  way  of  really  bad  water,  I  had  no  hesi- 
tation in  making  the  run  without  a  "pilot."  Launch- 
ing Imshallah  below  the  old  ferry-tower  at  two 
o'clock,  we  reached  the  little  town  of  Entiat,  just 
above  the  river  and  rapids  of  that  name,  at  five.  The 
skiff  rode  higher  with  Captain  Armstrong  and  his 
luggage  out,  her  increased  buoyancy  compensating 
in  a  measure  for  the  less  intelligent  handling  she  had. 


o 


< 

1-3 

&< 
O 

Q 

w 


fh-^^ljiH- 


WKNATCHEE  UNDER  THE  DUST  CLOUD  OF  ITS  SPEEDING 

AUT03   (above) 

HEAD   OF  ROCK   ISLAND   RAPIDS    (  below) 


CHELAN  TO  PASCO  289 

Roos  took  the  steering  paddle  in  the  stern,  and  I  con- 
tinued rowing  from  the  forward  thwart.  All  of  the 
luggage  was  shifted  well  aft.  The  current  was  fairly 
swift  all  the  way,  but  the  two  or  three  rapids  encoun- 
tered were  not  difficult  to  pass.  Ribbon  Cliff,  two 
thousand  feet  high  and  streaked  with  strata  of  yellow, 
grey  and  black  clays,  was  the  most  striking  physical 
feature  seen  in  the  course  of  this  easy  afternoon's 
run. 

Entiat  is  a  prosperous  little  apple-growing  centre, 
and,  with  the  packing  season  at  its  height,  was  jammed 
to  the  roof  with  workers.  Rooms  at  the  hotel 
were  out  of  the  question.  Roos  slept  on  a  couch  in 
the  parlour,  which  room  was  also  occupied  by  three 
drummers  and  two  truck  drivers.  I  had  a  shake- 
down on  a  canvased-in  porch,  on  which  were  six  beds 
and  four  cots.  My  room-mates  kept  me  awake  a  good 
part  of  the  night  growling  because  their  wages  had 
just  been  cut  to  seven  dollars  a  day,  now  that  the  rush 
was  over.  I  would  have  been  the  more  surprised  that 
any  one  should  complain  about  a  wage  like  that  had 
not  a  trio  of  farmettes — or  rather  packettes — at  the 
big  family  dinner  table  been  comparing  notes  of  their 
takings.  One  twinkling-fingered  blonde  confessed  to 
having  averaged  thirteen  dollars  a  day  for  the  last 
week  packing  apples,  while  a  brown-bloomered  bru- 
nette had  done  a  bit  better  than  twelve.  The  third 
one — attenuated,  stoop-shouldered  and  spectacled — 
was  in  the  dumps  because  sore  fingers  had  scaled 
her  average  down  to  ten-fifty — "hardly  worth  coming 
out  from  Spokane  for,"  she  sniffed.  Roos  tried  to 
engage  them  in  conversation,  and  started  out  auspi- 


290  DOAVN  THE  COLUMBIA 

ciously  with  a  descrii^tion  of  running  Box  Canyon. 
But  the  giiTilet-eyed  thin  one  asked  him  what  he  got 
for  doing  a  thing  hke  that,  and  promptly  their  inter- 
est faded.  And  why  should  they  have  cared  to  waste 
time  over  a  mere  seventy-five-dollar-a-week  camera- 
man? But  it  was  something  even  to  have  eaten  pump- 
kin pie  with  the  plutocracy. 

The  swift-flowing  Entiat  River  has  dumped  a  good 
many  thousand  tons  of  boulders  into  the  Columbia, 
and  most  of  these  have  lodged  to  form  a  broad,  shal- 
low bar  a  short  distance  below  the  mouth  of  the 
former.  The  Columbia  hasn't  been  able  quite  to  make 
up  its  mind  the  best  way  to  go  here,  and  so  has  hit  on 
a  sort  of  a  compromise  by  using  three  or  four  channels. 
Roos  found  himself  in  a  good  deal  the  same  sort  of 
dilemma  when  we  came  roUing  along  there  on  the 
morning  of  the  seventh,  but  as  a  boat — if  it  is  going 
to  preserve  its  entity  as  such — cannot  run  down  more 
than  one  channel  at  a  time,  Imshallak  found  the  at- 
tempt at  a  compromise  to  which  she  was  committed 
only  ended  in  butting  her  head  against  a  low  gravel 
island.  It  was  impossible  to  make  the  main  middle 
channel  from  there,  but  we  poled  off  without  much 
difficulty  and  went  bumping  off  down  a  shallow  chan- 
nel to  the  extreme  right.  She  kissed  off  a  boulder  once 
or  twice  before  winning  through  to  deeper  water,  but 
not  hard  enough  to  do  her  much  harm.  It  was  a  dis- 
tinctly messy  piece  of  work,  though,  and  I  was  glad 
that  Ike  or  Captain  Armstrong  was  not  there  to  see 
their  teachings  put  into  practice. 

The  river  cliffs  became  lower  as  we  ran  south,  and 
after  passing  a  commanding  point  on  the  right  bank 


CHELAN  TO  PASCO  291 

we  came  suddenly  upon  the  open  valley  of  the  Wen- 
atchee,  the  nearest  thing  to  a  plain  we  had  seen  in 
all  the  hundreds  of  miles  from  the  source  of  the  Co- 
lumbia. There  are  not  over  twenty  to  thirty  square 
miles  of  land  that  is  even  comparatively  level  here, 
but  to  eyes  which  had  been  wont  for  two  months  to 
seek  sky-line  with  a  forty-five  degree  upward  slant 
of  gaze  it  was  like  coming  out  of  an  Andean  pass 
upon  the  boundless  Pampas  of  Argentina.  Wenat- 
chee  was  in  sight  for  several  miles  before  we  reached 
it,  an  impressive  water-front  of  mills,  warehouses  and 
tall  buildings.  Over  all  floated  a  dark  pall,  such  as 
one  sees  above  Pittsburgh,  Birmingham,  Essen  or  any 
other  great  factory  city,  but  we  looked  in  vain  for  the 
forest  of  chimneys  it  would  have  taken  to  produce  that 
bituminous  blanket.  As  we  drew  nearer  we  discov- 
ered that  what  we  had  taken  to  be  smoke  was  a 
mighty  dust-cloud.  It  was  a  Sunday  at  the  height  of 
the  apple-packing  season,  and  all  the  plutocratic 
packettes  were  joy-riding.  There  were,  it  is  true, 
more  Fords  than  Rolls-Royces  in  the  solid  double 
procession  of  cars  that  jammed  the  main  street  for  a 
mile,  but  that  was  doubtless  because  the  supply  of  the 
former  had  held  out  better.  I  can't  believe  that  the 
consideration  of  price  had  anything  to  do  with  it. 

The  hotel,  of  course,  was  full,  even  with  the  dining- 
room  set  thick  with  cots,  but  by  admiring  a  haber- 
dashery drummer's  line  of  neck-ties  for  an  hour,  I 
managed  to  get  him  to  "will"  me  his  room  and  bath 
when  he  departed  that  afternoon.  Roos  employed 
similar  strategy  with  a  jazz  movie  orchestra  fiddler, 
but  his  train  didn't  pull  out  until  four-thirty  in  the 


292  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

morning.  A  young  reporter  from  the  local  paper 
called  for  an  interview  in  the  afternoon,  and  told  us 
the  story  of  the  Douglas,  the  steamer  which  Cap- 
tain McDermid  had  mentioned  as  having  been  lost  in 
trying  to  take  her  to  Portland.  Selig  had  gone  along 
to  write  the  story  of  the  run  through  Hock  Island 
Rapids,  the  first  to  be  reached  and  the  place  which 
was  reckoned  as  the  most  dangerous  she  would  have 
to  pass.  When  she  had  come  out  of  that  sinister  gorge 
without  mishap,  he  had  tliem  land  him  at  the  first 
convenient  place  in  the  quiet  water  below,  from  where 
he  made  his  way  to  the  railway  and  hurried  back  to 
Wenatchee  with  his  story.  That  he  had  seen  all  the 
best  of  the  excitement,  he  had  no  doubt.  A  quarter 
of  an  hour  after  Selig  left  her,  the  Douglas  was  a 
total  wreck  on  the  rocks  below  Cabinet  Rapids.  He 
didn't  know  just  how  it  had  happened,  but  said  we 
would  find  what  was  left  of  her  still  where  she  had 
struck. 

Wenatchee  is  the  liveliest  kind  of  a  town,  and 
claims  to  be  the  largest  apple-shipping  point  in  the 
United  States.  It  also  has  a  daily  paper  which  claims 
to  be  the  largest  in  the  world  in  a  city  of  under  ten 
thousand  population.  I  can  easily  believe  this  is  true. 
I  have  seen  many  papers  in  cities  of  fifty  or  a  hun- 
dred thousand  that  were  not  to  be  compared  with  it 
for  both  telegraphic  and  local  news.  Banks  are  on 
almost  every  corner  for  a  half  dozen  blocks  of  the 
main  street  of  Wenatchee,  and  every  one  seems  to 
have  a  bank  account.  I  saw  stacks  of  check-books 
by  the  cashiers'  desks  in  restaurants  and  shops,  and 


CHELAN  TO  PASCO  293 

in  one  of  the  ice  cream  parlours  I  saw  a  young  pack- 
ette  paying  for  her  nut  sundae  with  a  check. 

No  word  came  from  Captain  McDermid  during  the 
day,  and  after  endeavouring  to  reach  him  by  phone  all 
of  the  following  forenoon,  I  reluctantly  decided  to 
push  on  without  him.  This  was  a  good  deal  of  a  dis- 
appointment, not  only  because  I  felt  that  I  was  going 
to  need  his  help  mighty  badly,  but  also  because  I  was 
anxious  to  see  more  of  him  personally.  A  man  who 
will  take  a  steamer  containing  his  wife  and  children 
down  Rickey's  Rapids  of  the  Columbia  isn't  to  be  met 
with  every  day.  Roos  was  anxious  to  get  a  picture  of 
the  "Farmer  Who  Would  See  the  Sea"  working  his 
way  down  Rock  Island  Rapids,  and  as  his  machine 
was  about  the  most  valuable  thing  there  was  to  lose 
in  getting  down  there,  it  seemed  up  to  me  to  do  what 
I  could.  But  for  the  first  time  since  we  pushed  off 
to  run  the  Big  Bend,  I  unpacked  and  kept  out  my  ni- 
flatable  "Gieve"  life-preserver  waistcoat,  which  I  had 
worn  in  the  North  Sea  during  the  war,  and  which  I 
had  brought  along  on  the  "off  chance."  Selig  came 
down  with  his  Graflex  to  get  a  photo  of  our  departure 
for  the  World,  but  declined  an  invitation  for  another 
run  through  Rock  Island  Rapids. 

There  is  a  long  and  lofty  highway  bridge  spanning 
the  Columbia  half  a  mile  below  Wenatchee,  which 
fine  structure  also  appears  to  be  used  on  occasion  as 
a  city  dump.  That  it  was  functioning  in  this  capacity 
at  the  very  moment  we  were  about  to  pass  under  it 
between  the  two  mid-stream  piers  did  not  become 
apparent  until  the  swift  current  had  carried  us  so 


294  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

close  that  it  was  not  safe  to  try  to  alter  course  either 
to  left  or  right.  There  was  nothing  to  do  but  run  the 
gauntlet  of  the  swervily  swooping  dust-tailed  comets 
whose  heads  appeared  to  run  the  whole  gamut  of  dis- 
card of  a  rather  extravagant  town  of  eight  thousand 
people,  all  disdainful  of  "used"  things.  It  would 
have  been  a  rare  chance  to  renew  our  outfit,  only  most 
of  the  contributions  were  speeding  too  rapidly  at  the 
end  of  their  hundred-foot  drop  to  make  them  entirely 
acceptable.  "Low  bridge!"  I  shouted  to  Roos,  and 
swung  hard  onto  my  oars,  yelling  a  lung-full  at  every 
stroke  in  the  hope  that  the  busy  dumpers  might  stay 
their  murderous  hands  at  the  last  moment.  Vain 
hope!  jNIy  final  frightened  upward  glance  told  me 
that  the  nauseous  cataclysm  was  augmenting  rather 
than  lessening. 

I  put  Imshallah  into  some  mighty  nasty  looking 
rapids  with  a  lot  less  apprehension  than  I  drove  her 
into  that  reeking  second-hand  barrage,  that  Niagara 
of  things  that  people  didn't  want.  Doubtless  it  was 
the  fact  that  I  wanted  the  stuff  still  less  than  they  did 
that  lent  power  to  my  arms  and  gave  me  a  strength 
far  transcending  that  of  ordinary  endeavour.  Roos 
swore  afterward  that  I  lifted  her  right  out  of  the 
water,  just  as  a  speeding  hydroplane  lifts  at  the  top 
of  its  jump.  This  may  have  been  so;  but  if  it  was, 
Roos  sensed  it  rather  than  saw  it,  for  his  humped 
shoulders  were  folded  tightly  over  his  ducked  head, 
like  the  wings  of  a  newly  hatched  chicken.  Anyhow, 
the  little  lady  drove  through  safely,  just  as  she  always 
had.  But  where  she  had  always  emerged  dewy-fresh 
and  dancing  jauntily  on  the  tips  of  her  toes  from  the 


CHELAN  TO  PASCO  295 

roughest  of  rapids,  here  she  oozed  out  upon  an  oil- 
shcked  stream  with  the  "Mark  of  the  Beast"  on  her 
fore  and  aft.  I  mean  that  Hterally.  That  accursed 
little  "White  Wings"  that  sat  up  aloft  to  take  toll  of 
the  life  of  poor  Jack,  must  have  had  some  kind  of  a 
slaughter-house  dumping  contract  —  and  Imslial- 
lah  got  a  smothering  smear  of  the  proceeds.  Also 
a  trailing  length  of  burlap  and  a  bag  of  cinders.  As 
the  latter  burst  when  it  kissed  off  my  shoulder,  Roos' 
joke  about  my  wearing  sack-cloth-and-ashes  was  not 
entirely  without  point.  The  only  article  of  value  ac- 
cruing was  the  shaving-brush  which  fell  in  Roos'  lap. 
He  felt  sure  it  must  have  been  thrown  away  by  mis- 
take, for  it  had  real  camel's-hair  bristles,  and  he  liked 
it  better  than  his  own — after  the  ashes  had  worked  out 
of  it.  And  yet  it  might  have  been  a  lot  worse.  I  only 
heard  the  splash  of  the  wash-boiler  that  must  have  hit 
just  ahead  of  her,  but  the  sewing  machine  that  grazed 
her  stern  jazzed  right  across  my  line  of  vision. 

Up  to  that  time  Surprise  Rapids  of  the  Big  Bend 
of  Canada  had  stood  as  the  superlative  in  the  way  of  a 
really  nasty  hole  to  go  through;  from  then  on  "Sur- 
prise Rapids  of  Wenatchee  Bridge"  claimed  pride  of 
place  in  this  respect. 

Swabbing  down  decks  as  best  we  could  without 
landing,  we  pushed  ahead.  I  was  anxious  to  get  down 
to  Rock  Island  Rapids  in  time  to  look  over  the  chan- 
nels, if  not  to  start  through,  before  dark.  We  should 
have  known  better  than  to  treat  a  dainty  lady  like 
Imshallah  in  that  way.  It  was  bad  enough  to  have 
subjected  her  to  the  indignity  of  running  the  garbage 
barrage ;  not  to  give  her  a  proper  bath  after  it  was  un- 


296  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

pardonable.  At  least  that  was  the  way  she  seemed 
to  look  at  it,  and  so  I  never  felt  inclined  to  blame  her 
for  taking  matters  into  her  own  hands.  Wallowing 
through  a  sharp  bit  of  rapid  a  mile  below  the  bridge 
washed  the  outside  of  her  bright  and  clean  as  ever, 
but  it  was  the  stain  of  that  slaughter-house  stuff  on 
the  inside  that  rankled.  She  was  restive  and  cranky 
in  the  swirls  and  eddies  all  down  a  long  stretch  of 
slack  water  running  between  black  basalt  islands,  and 
as  the  river  narrowed  and  began  to  tumble  over  a 
boisterous  rapid  above  the  Great  Northern  Railway 
bridge,  she  began  jumping  about  nervously,  like  a 
spirited  horse  watching  his  chance  for  a  bolt. 

It  was  Roos'  business,  of  course,  to  watch  where 
she  was  going,  but  he  made  no  claim  of  being  a  quali- 
fied steersman;  so  that  there  was  really  no  excuse  for 
my  failing  to  watch  our  capricious  lady's  symptoms 
and  keep  a  steadying  hand  on  her.  Probably  I  should 
have  done  so  had  not  a  freiglit  train  run  out  on  the 
bridge  just  as  we  neared  the  head  of  the  rapid,  throw- 
ing out  so  striking  a  smoke-smudge  against  a  back- 
ground of  sun-silvered  clouds  that  I  needs  must  try 
for  a  hurried  snapshot.  That  done,  we  were  close  to 
the  "V"  of  the  drop-off,  and  I  had  just  time  to  see 
that  there  were  three  or  four  rather  terrifying  rollers 
tumbling  right  in  the  heart  of  the  riffle,  evidently 
thrown  up  by  a  jagged  outcrop  of  bed-rock  very  close 
to  the  surface.  I  would  never  have  chanced  putting 
even  a  big  hatteau  directly  into  so  wild  a  welter,  but, 
with  fairly  good  water  to  the  left,  there  was  no  need 
of  our  passing  within  ten  feet  of  the  centre  of  dis- 
turbance.   The  course  was  so  plain  that  I  do  not  re- 


CHELAN  TO  PASCO  297 

call  even  calling  any  warning  to  Roos  as  I  sat  down 
and  resumed  my  oars.  Each  of  us  claimed  the  other 
was  responsible  for  what  followed,  but  I  think  the 
real  truth  of  it  was  that  Imshallah  had  made  up  her 
mind  to  have  a  bath  without  further  delay,  and 
couldn't  have  been  stopped  anyhow. 

I  never  did  see  just  what  hit  us,  nor  how  we  were 
hit ;  for  it  all  came  with  the  suddenness  of  a  sand-bag- 
ging. Roos  was  stroking  away  confidently,  and  ap- 
peared to  be  singing,  from  the  movement  of  his  lips. 
The  words,  if  any,  were  drowned  in  the  roar.  All  at 
once  his  eyes  became  wild  and  he  lashed  out  with  a 
frenzied  paddle-pull  that  was  evidently  intended  to 
throw  her  head  to  the  left.  The  next  instant  the 
crash  came — sudden,  shattering,  savage.  I  remem- 
ber distinctly  wondering  why  Roos'  eyes  were  shifted 
apprehensively  upward,  like  those  of  a  man  who  fan- 
cies he  is  backing  away  from  a  bombing  airplane. 
And  I  think  I  recall  spray  dashing  two  or  three 
lengths  astern  of  us,  before  the  solid  battering  ram 
of  the  water  hit  me  on  the  back,  and  Roos  in  the  face. 
And  all  Imshallah  did  was  to  stand  straight  up  on 
her  hind  legs  and  let  little  demi-semi-quivers  run  up 
and  down  her  back  like  a  real  lady  exulting  in  the 
tickle  of  a  shower-bath.  Then  she  lay  down  and  let 
the  river  run  over  her ;  then  reared  up  on  her  hind  legs 
again.  Twice  or  thrice  she  repeated  that  routine, 
when,  apparently  satisfied  that  her  ablutions  were 
complete,  she  settled  down  and  ran  the  rest  of  the 
rapid  sedately  and  soberly,  and,  I  am  afraid,  with- 
out much  help  from  either  oars  or  paddle.  I  have 
always  thought  Roos  was  particularly  happy  in  his 


298  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

description  of  how  it  looked  for'ard  just  after  that 
first  big  wave  hit  us.  "The  top  of  that  comber  was 
ten  feet  above  your  head,"  he  said,  "and  it  came  curv- 
ing over  you  just  like  the  'canopy'  of  a  'Jack-in-the- 
Pulpit.'  " 

With  ImshaUah  rather  more  than  half  full  of 
water,  and  consequently  not  a  lot  more  freeboard  for 
the  moment  than  a  good  thick  plank,  it  was  just  as 
well  that  no  more  rapids  appeared  before  we  found  a 
patch  of  bank  flat  enough  to  allow  us  to  land  and 
dump  her.  Fresh  as  a  daisy  inside  and  out,  she  was 
as  sweet  and  reasonable  when  we  launched  her  again 
as  any  other  lady  of  quality  after  she  has  had  her 
own  way.  Not  far  below  the  bridge  we  tied  up  near 
the  supply-pipe  of  a  railway  pumping  station  on  the 
left  bank.  With  the  black  gorge  of  Rock  Island 
Rapids  three-quarters  of  a  mile  below  sending  up  an 
ominous  growl,  this  appeared  to  be  the  proper  place 
to  stop  and  ask  the  way. 

The  engineer  of  the  pumping-station  said  that  he 
knew  very  little  about  the  big  rapid,  as  he  had  only 
been  on  his  present  job  for  a  week.  He  had  only  seen 
the  left-hand  channel,  and,  as  an  old  sailor,  he  was 
dead  certain  no  open  boat  ever  launched  could  live 
to  run  the  lower  end  of  it.  He  said  he  thought  the 
safest  way  would  be  to  put  the  skiff  on  his  push-car, 
run  it  down  the  tracks  a  couple  of  miles,  and  launch 
it  below  the  worst  of  the  rapids.  I  told  him  we  might 
be  very  glad  to  do  this  as  a  last  resort,  but,  as  it  would 
involve  a  lot  of  time  and  labour,  I  would  like  to  look 
at  the  rapid  first.  He  told  us  to  make  free  of  his 
bunk -house  in  case  we  spent  the  night  there,  and  sug- 


CHELAN  TO  PASCO  299 

gested  we  call  in  at  a  farm  house  a  couple  of  hundred 
yards  down  the  track  and  talk  with  an  old  man  there, 
who  would  probably  know  all  about  the  rapid. 

That  proved  to  be  a  good  tip.  The  farmer  turned 
out  to  be  an  old-time  stern-wheeler  captain,  who  had 
navigated  the  upper  Columbia  for  many  years  in  the 
early  days.  He  was  greatly  interested  in  our  trip, 
and  said  that  we  ought  to  have  no  great  trouble  with 
the  rapids  ahead,  that  is,  as  long  as  we  didn't  try  to 
take  undue  liberties  with  them.  The  safest  way  to 
get  through  would  be  to  land  at  the  head  of  the  big 
island  that  divided  the  channels  and  line  right  down 
the  left  side  of  it.  It  would  be  pretty  hard  work,  but 
we  ought  not  to  get  in  wrong  if  we  took  our  time.  He 
was  sorry  he  couldn't  go  down  and  look  the  place 
over  with  us,  but  it  happened  that  his  youngest  daugh- 
ter was  being  married  that  evening,  and  things  were 
sort  of  crowding  for  the  rest  of  the  day.  That  ex- 
plained why  the  yard  was  full  of  flivvers,  and  the  nu- 
merous dressed-up  men  lounging  around  the  porches. 
We  decided  that  the  groom  was  the  lad,  with  an  ag- 
gressively fresh-shaven  gill,  who  was  being  made  the 
butt  of  a  joke  every  time  he  sauntered  up  to  a  new 
group,  and  that  the  bride  was  the  buxom  miss  having 
her  chestnut  hair  combed  at  a  window,  with  at  least 
half  a  dozen  other  girls  looking  on. 

Roos  was  very  keen  to  have  the  wedding  postponed 
to  the  following  morning,  and  changed  to  an  al  fresco 
affair  which  he  could  shoot  with  good  light.  With  a 
little  study,  he  said,  he  was  sure  he  could  work  it  into 
his  "continuity."  Perhaps,  for  instance,  the  "Farmer- 
Who-Would-See-the-Sea"  might  start  them  off  on 


300  DOWN  THE  COLU^SIBIA 

their  honeymoon  by  taking  them  a  few  miles  down 
river  in  his  boat.  That  would  lend  "heart  interest  and 
..."  I  throttled  that  scheme  in  the  bud  before  my 
impetuous  companion  could  broach  it  to  the  princi- 
pals. I  wasn't  going  to  tempt  the  providence  that  had 
saved  me  whole  from  the  wrath  of  Jock  o'  Winder- 
mere by  taking  a  chance  with  any  more  "bride  stuff." 
The  black-walled  gorge  of  Rock  Island  is  one  of 
the  grimmest-looking  holes  on  the  Columbia,  and  of 
all  hours  of  the  day  sunset,  when  the  deep  shadows 
are  banking  thick  above  the  roaring  waters,  is  the 
least  cheery  time  to  pay  it  a  visit.  Somewhat  as  at 
Hell  Gate,  the  river  spilts  upon  a  long,  rocky  island, 
the  broader,  shallower  channel  being  to  the  right,  and 
the  narrower,  deeper  one  to  the  left.  The  upper  end 
of  the  right-hand  channel  was  quiet  and  straight ;  in- 
deed, it  was  the  one  I  would  have  been  prompted  to 
take  had  not  the  old  river  captain  at  the  farm-house 
inclined  to  the  opinion  that  the  lining  on  the  other 
would  be  easier.  The  former  had  been  the  course 
Symons  had  taken,  and  he  mentioned  that  the  lower 
end  was  very  crooked  and  rocky.  I  decided,  there- 
fore, to  brave  the  difficulties  that  I  could  see  some- 
thing of  in  advance  rather  than  to  blunder  into  those 
I  knew  not  of.  Although  the  left  channel  began  to 
speed  up  right  from  the  head,  I  saw  enough  of  it  to 
be  sure  that  we  could  run  at  least  the  upper  two- 
thirds  of  it  without  much  risk,  and  that  there  was  then 
a  good  eddy  from  which  to  land  on  the  side  next  to 
the  railroad.  This  was  the  head  of  the  main  fall — an 
extremely  rough  cascade  having  a  drop  of  ten  feet  in 
four  hundred  yards.     Down  that  we  would  have  to 


CHELAN  TO  PASCO  301 

line.  I  was  quite  in  agreement  with  the  pump-station 
man  that  no  open  boat  would  live  in  those  wildly  roll- 
ing waters.  Fearful  of  complications,  I  restrained 
Roos  from  accepting  an  invitation  to  the  wedding,  and 
we  turned  in  early  for  a  good  night's  sleep  at  the 
pump-station  bunk-house. 

The  game  old  octogenarian  had  asked  me  especially 
to  hail  him  from  the  river  in  the  morning,  so  that  he 
could  go  down  and  help  us  through  the  rapids.  I 
should  have  been  glad  indeed  of  his  advice  in  what  I 
knew  would  be  a  mighty  awkward  operation,  but  had 
not  the  heart  to  disturb  him  when  I  saw  there  was  no 
curl  of  smoke  from  the  kitchen  chimney  when  we 
drifted  by  at  eight  o'clock.  The  roar  of  fast  and  furi- 
ous revelry  had  vied  with  the  roar  of  the  rapids  pretty 
well  all  night,  culminating  with  a  crescendo  leading  up 
to  the  old  shoe  barrage  at  about  daybreak.  It  didn't 
seem  quite  human  to  keep  the  old  boy  lining  down  river 
all  morning  after  lining  up  against  that  big  barrel  of 
"sweet  cider"  all  night.  .  .  .  (No,  I  hadn't  missed 
that  little  detail;  that  was  one  of  the  reasons  I  had 
kept  Roos  away) .  So  we  drifted  on  down  toward 
the  big  noise  alone.  The  pump-man  promised  he 
would  come  down  to  help  as  soon  as  his  tank  was 
filled,  but  that  wouldn't  be  for  an  hour  or  more. 

Rock  Island  Rapids  are  in  a  gorge  within  a  gorge. 
The  black  water-scoured  canyon  with  the  foam- 
white  river  at  the  bottom  of  it  is  not  over  fifty  feet 
deep  in  the  sheer.  Back  of  high-water  mark  there  is 
a  narrow  strip  of  bench  on  either  side,  above  which 
rises  a  thousand  feet  or  more  of  brown  bluff.  The 
eastern  wall  still  cast  its  shadow  on  the  river,  but  the 


302  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

reflection  of  the  straw-yellow  band  of  broadening 
light  creeping  down  the  western  bluff  filled  the  gorge 
with  a  diffused  golden  glow  that  threw  every  rock  and 
riffle  into  sharp  relief.  It  was  a  dozen  times  better 
to  see  by  than  the  blinding  brilliance  of  direct  light, 
and,  knowing  just  what  to  expect  for  the  next  quar- 
ter-mile, I  ran  confidently  into  the  head  of  the  rapid. 
Early  morning  is  the  hour  of  confidence  and  optimism 
on  the  flowing  road ;  evening  the  hour  of  doubt,  inde- 
cision and  apprehension. 

A  submerged  rock  at  the  entrance  to  the  left  chan- 
nel, which  I  had  marked  mentally  from  the  high  bank 
the  night  before  as  an  obstacle  to  be  avoided,  proved 
rather  harder  to  locate  from  water  level;  but  Roos 
spotted  it  in  time  to  give  it  a  comfortable  berth  in 
shooting  by.  Then  the  abrupt  black  walls  closed  in, 
and  we  ran  for  three  hundred  yards  in  fast  but  not 
dangerous  water.  The  current  took  us  straight  into 
the  eddy  I  had  picked  for  a  landing  place,  and  the 
skiff  slid  quietly  into  a  gentle  swirling  loop  of  back- 
water, with  nothing  but  a  huge  jutting  rock  interven- 
ing between  that  secure  haven  and  the  brink  of  the 
fall.  So  far  all  had  gone  exactly  as  planned.  Now 
we  were  to  see  how  it  looked  for  lining. 

Roos  set  up  on  a  shelf  and  cranked  while  I  lined 
round  the  projecting  rock,  an  operation  which  proved 
unexpectedly  simple  once  it  was  started  right.  At 
my  first  attempt  I  failed  to  swing  the  boat  out  of  the 
eddy,  and  as  a  consequence  she  was  brought  back 
against  the  rock  and  given  rather  a  stiff  bump.  The 
next  time  I  launched  her  higher  up,  and  paying  out 
plenty  of  scope,  let  her  go  right  out  into  the  main 


CHELAN  TO  PASCO  303 

current  and  over  the  "intake"  of  the  fall.  It  took 
brisk  following  up  to  keep  the  line  from  fouling,  and 
after  that  was  cleared  I  didn't  have  quite  as  much 
time  as  I  needed  to  take  in  slack  and  brace  myself  for 
the  coming  jerk.  The  result  was  Imshallah  got  such 
a  way  on  in  her  hundred  feet  of  run  that,  like  a  locoed 
broncho  pulling  up  and  galloping  off  with  its  picket- 
pin,  she  took  me  right  along  over  and  off  the  big  rock 
and  into  the  water  below.  To  my  great  surprise, 
where  I  was  expecting  to  go  straight  into  the  whirl- 
pool one  usually  finds  behind  a  projecting  rock,  I 
landed  in  water  that  was  both  slack  and  comparatively 
shallow.  Recovering  quickly  from  my  stumble,  I 
braced  against  the  easy  current  and  checked  the  run- 
away with  little  trouble.  Roos,  who  had  missed  the 
last  part  of  the  action,  wanted  me  to  do  that  jump 
and  stumble  over  again,  but  the  ten  foot  flop  down 
onto  the  not  very  deeply  submerged  boulders  was  a 
bit  too  much  a  shake-up  to  sustain  for  art's  sake. 

Now  that  it  was  too  late  to  line  back,  I  saw  why  it 
was  the  old  captain  had  advised  working  down  the 
side  of  the  island.  The  left  bank  of  the  cascade 
(which  latter  was  tumbling  close  beside  me  now), 
was  all  but  sheer.  Only  here  and  there  were  there 
footings  close  to  the  water,  so  that  the  man  with  the 
line  would  have  to  make  his  way  for  the  most  part 
along  the  top  of  the  rocky  wall.  He  could  get  along 
all  right,  but  there  was  no  place  where  a  man  could 
follow  the  boat  and  keep  it  off  with  a  pole.  It  might 
have  been  managed  with  a  man  poling-off  from  the 
boat  itself,  but  I  hardly  felt  like  .urging  Roos  to  take 
the  chance.    It  was  out  of  the  question  trying  to  line 


304  DOWN  THE  COLUIMBIA 

back  up  the  "intake"  of  the  fall,  but  there  was  one 
loop-hole  which  looked  worth  exploring  before  risk- 
ing an  almost  certain  mess-up  in  trying  to  work  down 
the  side  of  the  cascade. 

I  have  mentioned  that  I  had  expected  to  find  a 
whirli:)Ool  under  the  big  jutting  rock.  The  only  rea- 
son there  wasn't  one  was  because  what  at  high  water 
must  have  been  a  very  considerable  back  channel 
took  out  at  this  point  and  acted  as  a  sort  of  safety- 
valve.  There  was  still  a  stream  a  few  inches  deep 
flowing  out  here,  running  off  to  the  left  into  a  dark 
cavernous-looking  crack  in  the  bedrock.  That  water 
had  to  come  back  to  the  river  somewhere  below,  and 
there  was  just  a  chance  that  the  boat  could  be  squeezed 
through  the  same  way.  At  any  rate,  there  was  not 
enough  of  a  weight  of  water  to  do  any  harm,  and  it 
ought  not  to  be  hard  to  "back  up"  in  the  event  it 
proved  impossible  to  push  on  through.  Leaving 
Roos  to  set  up  and  shoot  a  particularly  villainous 
whirlpool  he  had  discovered,  I  dragged  the  skifip 
through  the  shallow  opening  and  launched  it  into  a 
deep  black  pool  beyond. 

Poling  from  pool  to  pool,  I  entered  a  miniature 
gorge  w^here  I  was  presently  so  walled  in  by  the  rock 
that  the  raw  roar  of  the  cascade  was  muffled  to  a 
heavy,  earth-shaking  rumble.  This  tiny  canyonette 
opened  up  at  the  end  of  a  hundred  yards  to  a  sheer- 
walled  rock-bound  pool,  evidently  scoured  out  by  the 
action  of  a  high-water  whirlpool.  This  turned  out 
to  be  an  enormous  "pot-hole,"  for  I  had  to  avoid  the 
water-spun  boulder,  which  had  been  the  tool  of  the 
sculpturing  River  God,  in  pushing  into  the  outlet 


CHELAN  TO  PASCO  305 

crack.  The  latter  was  so  narrow  and  over-hanging 
that  I  had  to  lie  down  and  work  the  skiff  along  with 
my  up-raised  hands.  Twenty  yards  of  that  brought 
me  out  to  a  winding  little  lake,  less  steeply  walled 
than  the  gorge  above,  but  apparently  closed  all  the 
way  round,  even  at  the  lower  end.  I  was  in  a  com- 
plete cul  de  sac.  A  gurgling  whirlpool  showed  where 
the  water  escaped  by  a  subterranean  passage,  but  that 
was  plainly  no  place  to  take  a  lady,  especially  a  lady 
of  quahty  like  ImsliallaJi. 

Tying  Imshallah  up  to  a  boulder  to  prevent  her 
amiable  weakness  for  rushing  to  the  embraces  of 
whirlpools  getting  the  better  of  her,  I  climbed  up  a 
steeply-sloping  pitch  of  bedrock  and  looked  down  to 
the  head  of  a  long  narrow  arm  of  quiet  water.  The 
gay  little  waterfall  breaking  forth  from  the  rock  be- 
neath my  feet  was  leaping  directly  into  the  main 
stream  of  the  Columbia — and  below  the  cascade.  A 
stiff  thirty  or  forty-foot  portage,  and  we  were 
through.  We  might  have  to  wait  for  the  pump-man 
to  help  us  lift  the  boat  up  that  first  pitch,  but  he 
ought  to  be  along  almost  any  time  now. 

Taking  a  short-cut  back  across  the  water-washed 
rock,  I  found  Roos  just  completing  his  shots  of  the 
cascade.  The  sun  was  on  the  latter  now,  and  its  daz- 
zling whiteness  threw  it  into  striking  relief  against 
the  sinister  walls  between  which  it  tumbled.  Save  the 
first  two  falls  of  Surprise  Rapids,  there  is  not  a  sav- 
ager  rush  of  water  on  the  upper  Columbia  than  this 
final  three  hundred  yards  of  the  left-hand  channel  of 
Rock  Island.  Roos  was  delighted  with  the  way  it 
showed  up  in  his  finder,  and  even  more  pleased  when 


306  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

he  learned  that  we  were  not  going  to  have  to  line  the 
boat  down  it.  Then  he  had  one  of  his  confounded 
inspirations.  That  portage  over  the  reef  of  bedrock, 
with  the  little  waterfall  in  the  background,  would 
photograph  hke  a  million  dollars,  he  declared ;  but  to 
get  the  full  effect  of  it,  and  to  preserve  "continuity," 
the  "farmer"  ought  to  do  it  alone.  It  wouldn't  do  to 
include  the  pump-man  in  the  picture,  now  that  the 
"farmer"  was  supposed  to  be  travelling  alone.  If  I 
had  to  have  his  help,  all  right;  only  it  wouldn't  do  to 
shoot  while  the  other  man  was  in  the  picture.  But  it 
would  really  be  the  "Cat's  ears"  if  the  "farmer"  could 
make  it  on  his  own.  He  wouldn't  have  to  make 
that  big  pull-up  without  stopping;  he  could  jerk 
the  boat  along  a  foot  or  two  at  a  time,  and  then  get 
his  breath  like  the  pursued  villain  did  in  the  pro- 
cessional finales  of  knockabout  comedies.  Then  he 
showed  me  how,  by  resuming  the  same  grip  on  the 
boat  and  the  same  facial  expression  at  each  renewed 
attack,  the  action  could  be  made  to  appear  practically 
continuous. 

Well,  I  fell  for  it.  Tom  Sawyer  was  not  more 
adroit  in  getting  out  of  white-washing  his  fence  than 
was  Roos  in  getting  out  of  that  portage  job.  He 
wanted  to  preserve  "continuity"  by  starting  back  at 
the  head  of  the  cascade,  but  we  compromised  by  mak- 
ing it  the  "pot-hole."  Emerging  to  the  lakelet,  I 
registered  "extreme  dejection"  at  finding  my  progress 
blocked,  and  "dull  gloom"  as  I  landed  and  climbed 
up  for  a  look-see.  But  when  I  reached  the  top  of  the 
reef  and  discovered  the  quiet  water  below,  like  sun- 
light breaking  through  a  cloud,  I  assumed  as  nearly  as 


CHELAN  TO  PASCO  307 

I  knew  how  an  exact  imitation  of  an  expression  I  had 
seen  on  the  face  of  Balboa  in  a  picture  called  "First 
Sight  of  the  Pacific."  "That's  the  'Cat's  ears,'  "  en- 
couraged Roos;  "now  snake  the  boat  over — and  make 
it  snappy!" 

I  made  it  snappy,  all  right;  but  it  was  my  spine 
that  did  most  of  the  snapping.  And  it  wasn't  a  foot 
at  a  time  that  I  snaked  the  boat  over.  (Roos  had 
been  too  optimistic  on  that  score)  ;  it  was  by  inches. 
Roos  took  infinite  pains  in  coaching  me  as  to  "resum- 
ing grip  and  expression;"  but  even  so,  I  am  afraid  the 
finished  film  will  display  considerable  jerkiness  in 
its  "continuous  action."  I  gained  some  solace  by  call- 
ing Roos  names  all  the  time,  and  so  must  again  beg 
"lip-readers"  who  see  the  picture  to  consider  the  prov- 
ocation and  not  judge  too  harshly.  Once  tilted  over 
the  crest  of  the  reef,  the  boat  took  more  holding  than 
hauling.  Being  pretty  well  gone  in  the  back  and 
knees,  she  got  away  from  me  and  slid  the  last  ten 
feet,  giving  her  bottom  a  bumping  that  it  never  did 
entirely  recover  from.  I  was  caulking  incipient  leaks 
all  the  way  to  Portland  as  a  consequence  of  that  con- 
founded "one  man"  portage. 

Just  as  we  had  loaded  up  and  were  ready  to  push 
off,  the  pump-man  breezed  along  and  asked  us  to 
give  him  a  passage  as  far  as  Columbia  River  station, 
two  or  three  miles  below.  He  wanted  to  take  an  oar, 
but  as  the  distance  was  short  and  the  current  swift,  I 
told  him  it  was  not  worth  bothering  with.  So  he  laid 
the  oar  he  had  taken  out  along  the  starboard  gun- 
wale, and  knelt  just  aft  the  after  thwart,  facing  for- 
ward.   Roos  always  claimed  that  it  was  the  loom  of 


308  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

the  pmnp-maii's  back  cutting  off  his  view  ahead  that 
was  responsible  for  the  Uttle  diversion  that  followed. 
A  good  part  of  the  blame  was  doubtless  my  own  for 
not  keeping  a  sharper  watch  over  my  shoulder,  as  I 
certainly  should  have  done  had  I  been  alone.  In  any 
event,  Imshallalis  alibi  was  complete.  She  behaved 
through  it  all  like  a  real  thoroughbred. 

There  was  a  sinuous  tangle  of  swirls  where  the 
right-hand  and  left-hand  cascades  flew  at  each  other's 
throats  at  the  lower  end  of  the  rock  island,  and  then  a 
gay  stretch  of  sun-dazzled  froth  where  the  teeth  of  a 
long  reef  menaced  all  the  way  across  the  channel; 
then  a  stretch  of  lazily-coiling  green-black  water, 
flowing  between  lofty  brown  cliffs  and  broken  here 
and  there  with  the  loom  of  house-like  rocks  of  shat- 
tered basalt.  The  roar  of  Rock  Island  died  down  in 
muffled  diminuendo,  and  it  seemed  mighty  good  to 
have  that  diapason  muttering  in  bafflement  astern 
rather  than  growling  in  anticipation  ahead.  There 
was  only  one  little  rapid  between  here  and  the  siding, 
the  pump-man  said,  and  it  wouldn't  bother  us  much  as 
there  was  plenty  of  room  to  get  by.  He  was  right — 
for  the  most  part. 

I  took  a  good  look  at  the  riffle  as  we  headed  down 
to  it.  It  was  a  short  stretch  of  rough,  noisy  water, 
but  nothing  that  would  have  had  to  be  avoided  except 
for  a  single  big  roller  in  the  middle  of  it.  As  this  was 
throwing  a  great  dash  of  spray  high  in  the  air  every 
now  and  then,  I  felt  sure  the  rock  responsible  for  it 
was  very  slightly  submerged — perhaps  not  more  than 
a  few  inches.  As  this  was  so  obviously  an  obstacle  to 
steer  well  clear  of,  it  never  occurred  to  me  to  give 


CHELAN  TO  PASCO  309 

Roos  any  especial  warning  about  it,  especially  as  he 
continued  standing  and  sizing  up  the  situation  for  half 
a  minute  after  I  had  resumed  my  oars.  The  main 
current  ran  straight  across  the  riffle,  but  with  fifty 
feet  of  clear  water  to  the  left  there  was  no  need  of 
getting  into  any  of  the  worst  of  it,  let  alone  trying  to 
hurdle  that  foam-throwing  rock. 

Leaning  hard  on  my  oars,  I  had  good  steerage-way 
on  the  skiff  by  the  time  she  dipped  over  into  the  fast- 
running  water.  Roos  was  cuffing  jauntily  at  the 
wave  crests,  and  singing.  Because  of  the  sequel,  I 
remember  particularly  it  was  "Dardanella"  that  was 
claiming  his  attention.  Two  or  three  times  he  had 
maintained  that  he  was  a  "lucky  fella"  before  I  saw 
what  seemed  to  me  to  be  mingled  dissent  and  pertur- 
bation gathering  in  the  pump-man's  steel-grey  eyes. 
Then,  all  of  a  sudden,  he  gave  vocal  expression  to  his 
doubts.  "You  won't  think  you're  a  'lucky  fella'  if 
you  put  her  onta  that  rock,"  he  yelled  over  his  shoul- 
der. Turning  at  the  finish  of  my  stroke,  I  saw  that 
big  spray-flipping  comber  about  two  lengths  away, 
and  dead  ahead,  looking  savager  than  ever.  Trailing 
my  right  oar,  I  pulled  every  ounce  I  could  bring  to 
bear  upon  my  left,  trying  to  throw  her  head  toward 
the  better  water.  The  next  instant  I  was  all  but  fall- 
ing over  backwards  as  the  oar  snapped  cleanly  off  in 
the  oar-lock.  I  recall  perfectly  the  gleam  of  the  long 
copper  nails  which  had  weakened  it,  and  the  fresh 
fracture  of  the  broken  spruce. 

The  weight  I  put  onto  my  right  oar  in  saving  my- 
self from  tumbling  backward  had  the  effect  of  throw- 
ing her  head  in  just  the  opposite  direction  I  had  in- 


310  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

tended.  Since  she  could  hardly  have  avoided  hitting 
the  hig  roller  anyhow,  once  she  was  so  near,  it  is 
probably  better  that  she  hit  it  squarely  than  sidling. 
The  crash  v/as  solid,  almost  shattering  in  its  intensity, 
and  yet  I  am  not  sure  that  she  hit  the  rock  at  all.  If 
she  did,  it  was  a  glancing  blow,  for  she  could  not  pos- 
sibly have  survived  anything  heavier. 

The  pump-man,  true  to  his  sailor  instincts,  kept 
his  head  perfectly  in  the  face  of  the  deluge  that  had 
engulfed  him.  The  spare  oar  was  lying  ready  to 
hand,  and  he  had  it  waiting  for  me  in  the  oar-lock  by 
the  time  I  was  on  an  even  keel  again.  The  second 
wave,  which  she  rode  on  her  own,  threw  Imshallalis 
head  off  a  bit,  but  by  the  time  she  was  rising  to  the 
third  I  was  helping  her  again  with  the  oars.  Seeing 
how  well  she  was  taking  it,  I  did  not  try  to  pull  out 
of  the  riffle  now,  but  let  her  run  right  down  through 
it  to  the  end.  Only  the  first  wave  put  much  green 
water  into  her,  but  even  that  had  not  filled  her  any- 
where nearly  so  deep  as  she  had  been  the  evening 
before.  When  we  beached  her  below  Columbia  River 
station  we  found  her  starboard  bow  heavily  dented, 
but  even  that  did  not  convince  me  that  we  had  hit  the 
big  rock.  I  am  rather  inclined  to  think  that  denting 
was  done  when  I  did  my  lone-hand  portage  at  Rock 
Island.  I  was  dead  sorry  I  couldn't  persuade  that 
pump-man  to  throw  up  his  job  and  come  along  with 
us.    He  had  the  real  stuff  in  him. 

After  having  lunch  in  the  railway  men's  eating 
house  at  Columbia  River,  we  went  down  to  push  off 
again.  Finding  the  local  ferry-man  examining  the 
skiff,  I  asked  him  if  he  thought  she  would  do  to  run 


THE  PICTURE  THAT  COST  ME  A  WETTING    {  above') 
THE  WRECK  OF  THE   "rOUCLAS"    (bdoiv) 


w  fe  2 

s  o 

'^  W  p 

l^>  t:  o 

P  H  « 

b  t,  - 

^  :^ 

^  a 
w 


CHELAN  TO  PASCO  311 

Cabinet  Rapids,  which  we  could  hear  rumbling  a  mile 
below.  "Not  if  you  try  to  push  them  out  of  the  river 
the  v/ay  you  did  that  riffle  above  here  a  while  ago," 
he  replied  with  a  grin.  He  said  he  had  been  watching 
us  through  his  glass,  and  that  the  boat  had  disap- 
peared from  sight  for  three  or  four  seconds  when  she 
hit  the  big  roller.  He  offered  to  bet  his  ferry-boat 
against  the  skiff  that  we  couldn't  do  it  again  and 
come  through  right-side-up.  No  takers.  Speaking 
seriously,  he  said  that,  by  keeping  well  to  the  left,  we 
could  run  Cabinet  all  right — if  nothing  went  wrong. 
"But  better  not  make  a  practice  of  breaking  an  oar 
just  where  you're  going  to  need  it  most,"  he  added 
with  another  grin;  "there's  nothing  on  the  river  that 
would  live  through  the  big  riffle  over  against  the  right 
bank.    You'll  see  what  she  did  to  the  Douglas." 

Landing  from  the  slack  water  above  a  rocky  point 
which  juts  out  into  the  river  at  the  head  of  Cabinet 
Rapids,  we  climbed  a  couple  of  hundred  yards  over 
water-scoured  boulders  to  the  brink  of  the  gorge.  It 
was  a  decidedly  rough-looking  rapid,  but  by  no  means 
so  hopeless  for  running  with  a  small  boat  as  Rock 
Island.  In  that  the  main  riffle  was  thrown  against  a 
sheer  bank  of  the  river,  it  reminded  me  a  good  deal 
of  Death  Rapids  on  the  Big  Bend.  But  this  riffle, 
while  appearing  fully  as  rough  as  that  of  the  dreaded 
Dalhs  des  Morts,  was  not,  like  the  latter,  unavoidable. 
The  chance  of  passing  it  in  only  fairly  broken  water 
to  the  left  looked  quite  good  enough  to  try.  The 
wreck  of  the  Douglas,  standing  out  white  and  stark 
against  the  black  boulders  a  mile  below,  was  a  good 
warning  against  taking  any  unnecessary  chances.    I 


312  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

looked  well  to  the  oars  and  the  trim  of  the  boat  before 
shoving  off. 

Once  out  into  the  river,  I  could  see  that  the  rapid 
was  white  from  bank  to  bank,  but  still  nothing  that 
ought  to  trouble  us  seriously.    I  stood  for  a  minute 
or  two  looking  ahead  from  the  vantage  of  one  of  the 
thwarts,  and  it  was  just  as  I  was  taking  up  my  oars 
again  in  the  quickening  current  that  the  corner  of  my 
eye  glimpsed  the  narrow  opening  of  a  deep  back- 
channel  winding  off  between  splintered  walls  of  co- 
lumnar basalt  to  the  left.     I  wasn't  looking  for  any 
more  one-man  portages,  but  this  opening  looked  good 
enough  to  explore.    It  might  lead  through  by  an  easy 
way,  and  there  was  hardly  enough  water  to  do  much 
harm  if  it  didn't.     It  took  hard  pulling  to  sheer  off 
from  the  "intake"  now  we  had  drifted  so  close,  but 
we  finally  made  it  and  entered  the  dark  back-channel. 
Narrowing  and  broadening,  just  as  the  other  had 
done,  it  led  on  for  a  couple  of  hundred  yards,  finally 
to  discharge  over  a  six-foot  fall  into  a  deeply  indented 
pool  that  opened  out  to  the  river  about  half  way  down 
the  rapid.    The  wedge-shaped  crack  at  the  head  of  the 
little  fall  was  narrower  than  the  skiff  at  water-line, 
but  by  dint  of  a  little  lifting  and  tugging  we  worked 
her  through  and  low^ered  her  into  the  pool  below. 
Pulling  out  through  the  opening,  we  headed  her  con- 
fidently into  the  current.     There  was  a  quarter-mile 
of  white  water  yet,  but  we  were  far  enough  down  now 
so  that  the  loss  of  an  oar  or  any  other  mishap  wouldn't 
leave  the  skiff  to  run  into  those  wallowing  rollers  over 
against  the  further  cliff.    A  sharp,  slashing  run  car- 
ried us  through  to  the  foot  of  Cabinet  Rapids,  and  a 


CHELAN  TO  PASCO  313 

few  minutes  later  we  had  hauled  up  into  an  eddy 
under  the  left  bank  opposite  the  wreck  of  the 
Douglas. 

The  little  stern-wheeler  had  come  to  grief  at  high- 
water,  so  that  we  had  to  clamber  all  of  three  hundred 
yards  over  big,  smooth,  round  boulders  to  reach  the 
point  where  the  wreck  was  lying.  The  latter  was  by 
no  means  in  so  bad  a  shape  as  I  had  expected  to  find  it. 
The  principal  damage  appeared  to  have  been  done  to 
the  wheel,  which  was  clamped  down  tight  over  a  huge 
boulder,  and  to  the  starboard  bow,  which  was  stove  in. 
The  rest  of  her  hull  and  her  upper  works  were  intact ; 
also  the  engines,  though  terribly  rusty.  There  was 
not  much  from  which  one  could  reconstruct  the  story 
of  the  disaster ;  in  fact,  I  have  not  learned  to  this  day 
any  authentic  details.  The  chances  are,  however,  that 
the  wheel  struck  a  rock  somewhere  in  Cabinet  Rapids, 
and,  after  that,  drifting  out  of  control,  she  had  come 
in  for  the  rest  of  the  mauling.  If  her  captain  is  like 
the  rest  of  the  Columbia  River  skippers  I  met,  I  have 
no  doubt  that  she  will  be  patched  up  again  before 
next  high-water  and  started  off  for  Portland. 

With  towering  cliffs  on  both  sides  and  the  great 
black  boulders  scattered  all  around,  Roos  felt  that 
both  subject  and  setting  were  highly  favourable  for 
an  effective  movie,  and  started  to  think  out  a  way  to 
work  the  wreck  of  the  Douglas  into  his  "continuity." 
After  some  minutes  of  brown  study,  he  declared  that 
the  best  way  to  work  it  would  be  for  the  "farmer"  to 
land,  come  clambering  across  the  boulders  registering 
"puzzled  wonderment,"  and  then  to  stand  in  silent 
contemplation  of  the  wreck,  registering  "thankful^ 


314  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

ness."  "Thankfulness  for  what?"  I  demanded;  "it 
doesn't  strike  nie  as  Christian  to  gloat  over  the  wreck 
of  a  ship."  "You  don't  get  me  at  all,"  he  expostu- 
lated. "I  don't  mean  for  him  to  show  thankfulness 
because  of  the  wreck  of  the  steamer,  but  because  his 
own  boat  has  so  far  escaped  a  similar  fate.  He  just 
stands  here  with  his  arms  folded,  casts  his  eyes  up- 
ward, moves  his  lips  as  if  .  .  ." 

"Nothing  doing,"  I  cut  in  decisively.  "If  you'd 
been  raising  beans  and  hay  and  apricots  as  long  as  I 
have,  you'd  know  that  a  farmer  never  registers  thank- 
fulness about  anything  but  a  rise  in  the  market,  and 
there  ain't  no  such  thing  any  more."  While  we  were 
arguing  that  moot  point,  the  sun  dipped  behind  the 
loftily  looming  wall  of  brown-black  cliff  across  the 
river  and  the  trouble  settled  itself  automatically. 
Because  there  was  no  longer  light,  Roos  thought  it 
would  be  a  good  stunt  to  camp  where  we  were  until 
morning,  and  as  a  camp  was  always  "continuity" — 
there  we  were! 

There  was  plenty  of  cordwood  left,  and  the  galley 
stove  was  in  good  condition.  As  we  had  no  candles, 
dinner  was  cooked  by  the  mingled  red  and  green 
gleams  of  the  port  and  starboard  lights,  transferred  to 
the  galley  for  that  purpose.  I  slept  in  the  cook's 
cabin  and  Roos — with  his  bed  made  up  on  the  wire 
springs  from  the  Captain's  cabin — on  the  deck  of  the 
galley.  With  water  freezing  half  an  inch  thick  in  the 
coffee-pot  on  the  galley  stove,  we  had  an  insufferably 
cold  night  of  it — one  of  the  worst  we  spent  on  the  river. 
In  the  morning  Roos  made  his  "camp  shots,"  which 
consisted  principally  of  the  farmer  chopping  cord- 


CHELAN  TO  PASCO  315 

wood  on  the  main  deck,  building  a  fire  in  the  galley 
stove  and  cooking  breakfast.  Out  of  deference  to 
my  esoteric  knowledge  of  the  way  farmers  feel  about 
things,  he  consented  to  omit  the  "thankfulness  stuff." 

Shoving  off  into  a  steady  six-mile  current  at  nine- 
thirty,  a  few  minutes  brought  us  in  sight  of  a  striking 
basaltic  island,  which  Symons  had  characterized  as 
"one  of  the  most  perfect  profile  rocks  in  existence." 
"Approaching  it  from  the  north,"  he  wrote,  "it  pre- 
sents a  striking  likeness  to  the  profile  of  Queen  Vic- 
toria. .  .  .  Coming  nearer  to  it  and  passing  it  on  the 
west,  the  profile  changes  and  merges  into  a  more 
Grecian  and  Sphinx-like  face,  whose  placid  immo- 
bility takes  one's  mind  involuntarily  to  far-off  Egypt. 
It  rises  from  the  surface  of  the  water  about  a  hundred 
feet,  and  a  pair  of  eagles  have  selected  it  as  their  home, 
and  upon  its  extreme  top  have  built  a  nest,  giving,  as 
it  were,  a  crown  to  this  goddes  of  the  Columbia." 

Roos  declared  himself  strong  for  that  "Sphinx 
stuff,"  and  had  his  camera  set  up  in  the  bow  ready 
for  a  close-up  of  every  change  of  expression.  He  was 
doomed  to  disappointment.  The  first  thing  we  dis- 
covered missing  was  the  crowning  eagles'  nest,  and 
then  Victoria's  nose,  mouth  and  chin.  Her  brow  and 
hair  were  there,  but  both  considerably  eroded  and 
inroad-ed  by  the  weather.  The  "Grecian-and- 
Sphinx-like  face"  we  never  did  locate,  although  I 
pulled  around  the  island  twice  in  search  of  them. 
Roos  declared  her  an  "oil  can,"  and  packed  up  his 
camera  in  supreme  disgust.  That  was,  I  believe,  the 
last  time  he  had  it  set  up  on  the  Columbia. 

As  Lieutenant  Symons  had  proved  so  invariably 


316  DOWN  THE  COLUINIBIA 

accurate  in  all  of  his  topographical  descriptions,  I  am 
strongly  inclined  to  the  belief  that  floods  and  the 
elements  had  conspired  to  wreak  much  havoc  with 
"Victoria's"  features  in  the  forty  years  that  had 
elapsed  since  he  limned  them  so  strikingly  with  pen 
and  pencil.  I  have  known  fairly  stonily-featured 
ladies  to  change  almost  as  much  in  a  good  deal  less 
than  forty  years. 

Cabinet  Rapids  is  the  beginning  of  a  somewhat 
irregular  series  of  columnar  basaltic  cliffs  which  wall 
in  the  Columbia  closely  for  the  next  thirty  miles. 
They  range  in  height  from  fifteen  hundred  to  three 
thousand  feet,  and  in  colour  from  a  rich  blend  of  saf- 
fron-cinnamon, through  all  the  shades  of  brown,  to  a 
dull  black.  The  prevailing  formation  is  that  of  up- 
ended cordwood,  but  there  are  endless  weird  stratifi- 
cations and  lamiations,  with  here  and  there  queer 
nuclei  that  suggest  sulphur  crystallizations.  Im- 
bedded in  the  face  of  one  of  these  cliffs  not  far  from 
the  tumultuous  run  of  Gualquil  Rapids,  is  a  land- 
mark that  has  been  famous  among  Columbia  voy- 
ageurs  for  over  a  hundred  years.  This  is  huge  log, 
barkless  and  weather-whitened,  standing  on  end  in 
the  native  basalt.  Over  a  thousand  feet  above  the 
river  and  almost  an  equal  distance  from  the  brink  of 
the  sheer  wall  of  rock,  there  is  no  possible  question  of 
its  having  been  set  there  by  man.  The  descriptions 
written  of  it  a  hundred  years  ago  might  have  been 
written  to-day.  Whether  it  is  petrified  or  not,  there 
is  no  way  of  knowing.  The  only  possible  explanation 
of  its  presence  is  that  it  was  lodged  where  it  is  at  a 
time   when   the   Columbia  flowed   a  thousand   feet 


CHELAN  TO  PASCO  317 

higher  than  it  does  to-day,  probably  before  it  tore  its 
great  gorge  through  the  Cascades  and  much  of  what 
is  now  eastern  Washington  was  a  vast  lake. 

On  the  suggestion  of  the  ferry-man  at  Trinidad,  we 
avoided  the  upper  half  of  Gualquil  Rapids  by  taking 
a  straight,  narrow  channel  to  the  right,  which  would 
probably  have  been  dry  in  another  week.  There  is  a 
half  mile  of  fast,  white  water  here,  ending  with  some 
heavy  swirls  against  a  sheer  cliff,  but  nothing  seri- 
ously to  menace  any  well-handled  open  boat.  The 
water  was  slack  for  a  number  of  miles  from  the  foot 
of  Gualquil,  but  began  quickening  where  the  river 
spread  out  between  long  gravel  bars  below  Vantage 
Ferry.  They  were  shunting  sheep  across  at  the  latter 
point,  and  the  Portuguese  herders  crowded  eagerly 
round  our  boat,  making  strange  "high  signs"  and 
voicing  cryptic  utterances,  evidently  having  some- 
thing to  do  with  a  local  bootleggers'  code.  At  our 
failure  to  respond  in  kind,  they  became  suspicious 
(doubtless  the  fact  that  Roos  was  wearing  a  second- 
hand Canadian  officer's  uniform  he  had  bought  in 
Revelstoke  had  something  to  do  with  it)  that  we  were 
prohibition  enforcement  officials,  and  they  were  mut- 
tering darkly  to  each  other  and  shaking  their  heads 
as  we  pushed  off  again. 

The  cHffs  ran  out  not  long  after  we  left  Vantage 
Ferry,  and  as  we  neared  the  Chicago,  Milwaukee  and 
St.  Paul  Bridge  at  Beverly  rough  patches  of  sandy 
desert  began  opening  up  on  either  side.  Deprived  of 
the  shelter  of  the  high  river  walls,  we  were  at  once  ex- 
posed to  a  heavj^  easterly  wind  that  had  evidently 
been  blowing  all  day  on  the  desert.    The  sun  dulled 


318  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

to  a  luminous  blur  behind  the  pall  of  the  sand-filled 
air,  and  the  wind,  which  headed  us  every  now  and 
then,  about  neutralized  the  impulse  of  the  accelerat- 
ing current.  There  was  a  forty-miles-an-hour  sand- 
storm blowing  when  we  beached  the  boat  under  the 
raihvay  bridge  at  four-thirty.  The  brilliantly  gol- 
den-yellow cars  of  the  C.  INI.  &  St.  P.  Limited  rum- 
bling across  above  behind  their  electric  locomotive 
seemed  strangely  out-of-place  in  the  desolate  land- 
scape. 

The  one  sidewalk  of  the  town's  fragment  of  street 
was  ankle-deep  in  sand  as  we  buffetted  our  way  to 
the  hotel.  "Have  you  ever  been  in  Beverly  before?" 
asked  the  sandy-haired  (literally)  girl  who  responded 
to  the  jangle  of  the  cowbell  on  the  counter.  "But 
I  should  know  better  than  that,"  she  apologized  with 
a  blush  as  she  blew  off  the  grit  on  the  register ;  "  'cause 
if  you  had  been  here  once,  you'd  sure  never  be  here 
again.  What's  the  game,  anyhow?  You  haven't 
.  .  .?"  A  knowing  twitch  of  a  dusty  eyelash  finished 
the  question. 

"No,  we  haven't,"  growled  Roos  irritably.  Some- 
how he  was  never  able  to  extract  half  the  amusement 
that  I  did  over  being  taken  for  a  boot-legger. 

It  was  the  sand-storm  that  broke  Roos'  heart,  I 
think.  He  was  non-committal  at  supper  that  night 
when  I  started  to  talk  about  Priest  Rapids,  and  the 
next  morning,  after  describing  his  shave  as  like  rub- 
bing his  face  with  a  brick,  he  announced  that  he  was 
through  with  the  Columbia  for  good.  As  there  was  a 
good  deal  to  be  said  for  his  contention  that,  between 
the  shortening  days  and  the  high  cliffs  walling  in  the 


CHELAN  TO  PASCO  319 

river,  there  were  only  two  or  three  hours  of  good 
shooting  light  even  when  the  sun  was  out,  I  did  not 
feel  justified  in  urging  him  to  go  on  unless  he  wanted 
to.  In  any  event,  light  for  filming  the  running  and 
lining  of  Priest  Rapids,  now  that  the  sand-storm  was 
at  its  height,  was  out  of  the  question  for  a  day  or  two 
at  least.  And  below  Priest  Rapids  there  would  be 
nothing  worth  filming  until  the  mouth  of  the  Snake 
was  passed.  I  suggested,  therefore,  that  he  should 
go  on  to  Pasco  by  train  and  await  me  there,  finding 
out  in  the  meantime  by  wire  whether  Chester  cared 
to  have  him  continue  the  "farmer"  picture  in  the  face 
of  the  adverse  light  conditions. 

By  this  time  I  had  fairly  complete  data  on  Priest 
Rapids.  These,  beginning  at  the  end  of  a  stretch  of 
slack  water  several  miles  below  Beverly,  continue  for 
eleven  miles.  In  this  distance  there  are  seven  major 
riffles,  with  considerable  intervals  of  fairly  quiet  water 
between.  It  seemed  probable  that  all  of  these,  with 
the  exception  of  the  second  and  seventh,  and  possibly 
the  sixth,  could  be  run.  The  lining  of  the  others, 
while  not  difficult,  would  require  the  help  of  another 
man.  All  that  morning  I  inhaled  sand  as  I  went 
over  Beverly  with  a  fine-toothed  comb  in  a  very 
earnest  effort  to  find  some  one  willing  to  give  me  a 
hand  through  Priest  Rapids.  The  nearest  I  came  to 
success  was  an  ex-brakeman,  who  said  he  would  go 
with  me  after  the  storm  was  over,  provided  a  job 
hadn't  turned  up  in  the  meantime.  The  only  real 
river-man  I  found  was  an  old  chap  who  opined  that 
the  middle  of  November  was  too  late  in  the  year  to 
be  getting  his  feet — if  nothing  else — wet  in  the  "Co- 


320  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

luniby."  He  offered  to  haul  the  boat  to  the  foot  of 
the  rapids  by  the  road  for  twenty  dollars,  but  as  the 
down-river  branch  of  the  INIilwaukee  presented  an  op- 
portunity to  accomplish  the  same  end  in  less  time  and 
discomfort,  I  decided  to  portage  by  the  latter.  As 
there  was  an  auto-stage  service  from  Hanford  to 
Pasco,  Roos  accompanied  me  to  the  former  point  by 
train,  and  helped  get  the  boat  down  to  the  river  and 
into  the  water  in  the  morning.  Hanford  was  not  the 
point  on  the  line  closest  to  the  foot  of  Priest  Rapids, 
but  I  took  the  boat  through  to  there  because  the  sta- 
tion was  nearer  the  river  than  at  White  Bluffs,  and 
launching,  therefore,  a  simpler  matter. 

The  stretch  of  seventy  miles  between  the  foot  of 
Priest  Rapids  and  the  mouth  of  the  Snake  has  the 
slowest  current  of  any  part  of  the  Columbia  above  the 
Dalles.  Mindful  of  the  time  we  had  been  losing  by 
stops  for  lunch,  I  now  began  putting  into  practice  a 
plan  which  I  followed  right  on  to  the  end  of  my  voy- 
age. Taking  a  package  of  biscuit  and  a  couple  of 
bars  of  milk  chocolate  in  my  pocket,  I  kept  the  river 
right  staight  on  through  to  my  destination.  Munch- 
ing and  resting  for  an  hour  at  noon,  I  at  least  had  the 
benefit  of  the  current  for  this  period.  Eating  a  much 
lighter  lunch,  I  also  gained  the  advantage  of  no  longer 
being  troubled  with  that  comfortable  siesta-time 
drowsiness  that  inevitably  follows  a  hearty  meal  and 
disinclines  one  strongly  to  heavy  exertion  for  an  hour 
or  more. 

For  a  dozen  miles  or  more  below  Hanford  the  river, 
flanked  on  either  side  by  rolling  desert  sand-dunes,, 
winds  in  broad  shallow  reaches  through  a  region  des- 


CHELAN  TO  PASCO  321 

olate  in  the  extreme.  The  only  signs  of  life  I  saw  for 
many  miles  were  coyotes  slinking  through  the  hungry 
sage-brush  and  occasional  flocks  of  geese,  the  latter 
forerunners  of  the  countless  myriads  that  were  to  keep 
me  company  below  the  Snake.  At  Richfield  the  re- 
sults of  irrigation  became  evident  in  young  apple 
orchards  and  green  fields  of  alfalfa,  and  these  multi- 
plied all  the  way  down  to  Pasco.  The  country  seemed 
very  flat  and  monotonous  after  so  many  weeks  among 
cliffs  and  mountains,  but  there  was  no  question  of  its 
richness  and  productivity  once  water  was  brought  to 
it.  The  low  overflow  flats  about  the  mouth  of  the 
Yakima,  which  flows  into  the  Columbia  from  the  west 
a  few  miles  above  Pasco,  gave  little  indication  of  the 
beauty  of  the  famous  apple  country  which  owes  so 
much  to  the  waters  diverted  from  that  little  river. 

After  pulling  for  an  hour  with  the  long  Northern 
Pacific  bridge  in  \aew,  I  landed  just  below  the  Pasco- 
Kennewick  ferry  at  three  o'clock.  As  I  was  beaching 
the  boat  and  getting  out  the  luggage  to  leave  in  the 
ferry-man's  house-boat,  a  hail  from  the  river  attracted 
my  attention.  It  was  from  Roos,  in  the  front  seat  of 
an  auto,  on  the  approaching  ferry-boat.  His  stage 
had  been  behind  time  in  leaving  Hanford,  and  as  a 
consequence  I  had  beaten  him  to  the  Pasco  landing 
by  ten  minutes.  After  the  speed  with  which  we  had 
moved  on  the  upper  river,  however,  mine  had  been 
rather  a  slow  run.  In  spite  of  my  steady  pulling,  it 
had  taken  me  just  under  six  hours  to  do  the  thirty- 
five  miles. 

After  the  exchange  of  a  wire  or  two,  Roos  obtained 
permission  from  Chester  to  suspend  the   "farmer" 


322  DOAVN  THE  COLUMBIA 

picture,  and  was  ordered  on  to  New  York  to  report. 
AVe  were  both  a  good  deal  disai^poiiited  not  to  have  a 
pictorial  record  of  the  "farmer"  actually  seeing  the 
sea;  in  fact,  we  did  some  hours  of  "location"  scouting 
in  the  hope  of  finding  a  substitute  Pacific  in  the 
vicinity  of  Pasco.  If  that  Beverly  sand-storm  had 
only  made  itself  felt  seventy-five  miles  farther  down 
river  I  honestly  believe  we  would  have  accomplished 
our  worthy  end.  There  was  a  pretty  bit  of  white 
beach  below  the  N.  P.  bridge.  If  the  sand  had  been 
blowing  thick  enough  to  obscure  the  farther  shore, 
and  if  the  wind  had  blown  in  the  right  direction  to 
throw  up  a  line  or  two  of  surf,  I  could  have  stood 
with  one  foot  on  that  beach,  the  other  on  Imsliallalis 
bow,  elbow  on  knee,  chin  in  hand,  and  registered  "ful- 
filment," and  none  could  have  told  it  from  the  real 
Pacific.  Indeed,  that  bit  of  backwash  from  Pasco's 
outfall  sewer,  with  the  sand-barrage  and  surf  I  have 
postulated,  would  have  "shot"  7norc  like  the  Pacific 
than  many  spots  I  can  think  of  looking  off  to  the 
Columbia  bar. 


CHAPTER  XIII 


PASCO    TO    THE    DALLES 


The  only  lone-hand  river  voyage  I  had  ever  taken 
previous  to  the  one  on  which  I  was  about  to  embark 
was  down  the  lower  Colorado  River,  from  Needles  to 
the  head  of  the  Gulf  of  California.  This  had  been  in 
comparatively  quiet  water  all  the  way,  with  nothing 
much  to  look  out  for  save  the  tidal  bore  at  the  lower 
end.  As  I  had  never  been  above  the  Dalles  on  the 
lower  Columbia,  I  had  very  little  idea  of  what  I  would 
encounter  in  the  way  of  rapids.  I  knew  that  there 
were  locks  by  which  the  Dalles  and  Cascades  could 
be  passed,  but  as  the  combined  fall  at  these  points 
accounted  for  only  about  a  quarter  of  that  between  the 
Snake  and  tide- water,  it  was  certain  there  must  still 
be  some  very  swift  rapids  to  run.  That  there  had  at 
times  been  a  steamer  service  maintained  from  the 
Snake  down  meant  that  there  must  be  some  sort  of  a 
rock-free  channel  through  all  of  the  riffles ;  but  it  did 
not  necessarily  mean  that  these  were  runnable  in  a 
small  boat.  A  properly  handled  stern-wheeler  can 
be  drifted  down  and  (by  means  of  line  and  capstan) 
hauled  up  rapids  where  not  even  a  high-powered 
launch  can  live.  I  had  a  list  of  about  a  score  of  the 
principal  rapids  between  the  Snake  and  Celilo  Falls, 
with  their  distances  from  the  Canadian  Boundary 
by  river.  This  would  enable  me  to  know  approxi- 
mately where  I  was  going  to  find  them.    That  was  all. 


323 


324  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

Information  on  fall,  channel  and  the  best  means  of 
runnmg  them  I  would  have  to  pick  up  as  I  went  along. 

I  shoved  off  from  Pasco  Ferry  at  nine  o'clock  in 
the  morning  of  Sunday,  November  fourteenth.  With 
Roos  and  his  blanket-roll,  camera  and  tripod  out  of 
the  stern,  I  found  that  the  skiff  trimmed  better  when 
I  rowed  from  the  after  thwart.  She  pulled  easier  and 
handled  a  lot  more  smartly  now.  It  was  evident, 
however,  that  her  increased  freeboard  was  going  to 
make  her  harder  to  hold  to  her  course  with  head  winds, 
but  these  I  hoped  to  have  little  trouble  with  until  I 
reached  the  gorge  of  the  Cascades.  The  ferry-man 
assured  me  that  I  would  encounter  no  really  bad 
water  until  I  came  to  the  last  pitch  of  Umatilla 
Rapids,  about  thirty-five  miles  below.  He  advised 
me  to  take  a  good  look  at  that  before  putting  into  it, 
as  an  unbroken  reef  ran  almost  directly  across  the 
current  and  the  channel  was  not  easy  to  locate.  It 
was  the  most  troublesome  bar  to  navigation  on  the 
lower  Columbia,  and  steamers  were  repeatedly  get- 
ting in  trouble  there.  I  would  see  the  latest  wreck  a 
couple  of  miles  below  the  foot  of  the  rapids. 

I  passed  the  mouth  of  the  Snake  about  three  miles 
below  the  ferry.  Here  was  no  such  spectacular  meet- 
ing of  waters  as  occurs  when  tlie  Pend  d'Oreille  and 
Columbia  spring  together,  for  the  countrj^  is  low  and 
level,  and  the  mouth  of  the  Snake  broad  and  shallow. 
The  discharge  w^as  through  two  channels,  and  the 
water  greenish-grey  in  colour;  but  where  that  blend 
in  the  swift  tributaries  of  the  upper  river  suggests  the 
intense  coldness  of  glacial  origin,  here  the  picture 
conjured  up  was  of  desert  and  alkali  plains.     Its 


PASCO  TO  THE  DALLES  325 

mouth  is  the  least  interesting  part  of  the  Snake.  It 
has  some  magnificent  canyons  in  its  upper  and  middle 
waters — as  have  also  its  two  fine  tributaries,  the  Sal- 
mon and  Clearwater, — and  its  Shoshone  Falls  are 
second  only  to  Niagara  on  the  North  American  conti- 
nent. 

Lieutenant  Symons,  who  concluded  his  exploration 
of  the  upper  Columbia  at  the  Snake,  characterizes  the 
region  as  a  "bleak,  dreary  waste,  in  which  for  many 
miles  around  sage-brush  and  sand  predominate  .  .  . 
one  of  the  most  abominable  places  in  the  country  to 
live  in."  Alexander  Ross,  on  the  other  hand,  writing 
seventy  years  earlier,  describes  it  as  one  of  the  loveliest 
lands  imaginable.  The  fact  that  the  one  reached 
the  Snake  in  the  fall  and  the  other  in  the  spring  may 
have  had  something  to  do  with  these  diametrically 
opposed  impressions.  Irrigation  and  cultivation  have 
gone  far  to  redeem  this  land  from  the  desert  Symons 
found  it,  but  it  is  still  far  from  being  quite  the  Para- 
dise Ross  seemed  to  think  it  was.  As  the  only  con- 
siderable plain  touching  the  Columbia  at  any  point  in 
its  course,  this  region  of  the  Snake  can  never  make  the 
scenic  appeal  of  the  hundreds  of  miles  of  cliff-walled 
gorges  above  and  below;  but  it  is  a  land  of  great  po- 
tential richness.  With  water  and  power  available 
from  the  two  greatest  rivers  of  the  West,  there  can  be 
no  question  of  its  future,  both  agriculturally  and  in- 
dustrially. Pasco  will  yet  more  than  fulfil  the  prom- 
ises made  for  that  mushroom  town  in  its  early  boom 
days.  "KEEP  YOUR  EYE  ON  PASCO!"  was 
a  byword  from  one  end  of  the  country  to  the  other  in 
the  nineties,  and  this  hustling  rail  and  agricultural 


326  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

centre  at  the  junction  of  the  Columbia  and  the  Snake 
should  not  be  lost  sight  of  even  to-day. 

The  lighter-hued  water  of  the  Snake  was  pretty 
well  churned  into  the  flood  of  the  Columbia  at  the  end 
of  a  mile,  leaving  a  faint  suggestion  of  cloudiness  in 
the  transparent  green  that  the  latter  had  preserved 
all  the  way  from  the  Arrow  Lakes.  The  long  bridge 
of  the  Spokane,  Portland  and  Seattle  Railway 
spanned  the  Columbia  just  below  the  Snake,  and 
from  there  on  paralleled  the  river  closely  right  down 
to  the  Willamette.  After  the  Oregon- Washington 
Railway  and  Navigation  Company  tracks  appeared 
on  the  south  bank  below  the  Walla  Walla,  it  was  only 
at  rare  intervals  that  I  was  out  of  sight  of  a  grade,  or 
out  of  sound  of  a  train,  for  the  remainder  of  my  voy- 
age. In  a  day  or  two  the  trainmen,  running  back  and 
forth  between  divisional  points,  came  to  recognize 
the  bright  green  skiff  plugging  on  down  the  dark 
green  river  (mighty  small  she  must  have  looked  to 
them  from  the  banks)  and  never  failed  to  give  her  a 
hail  or  a  wave  in  passing.  On  a  certain  memorable 
occasion  one  of  them  (doubtless  in  direct  defiance  of 
rules)  ventured  even  further  in  the  way  of  a  warning 
.  .  .  but  I  will  tell  of  that  in  its  place. 

Homley  Rapids,  seven  miles  below  Pasco  ferry, 
are  formed  by  a  rough  reef  of  bedrock  running  half 
way  across  the  river  from  the  right  bank.  Approached 
from  the  right  side  of  the  long  gravel  island  that  di- 
vides the  river  just  above  them,  one  might  get  badly 
tangled  up  before  he  got  through;  by  the  left-hand 
channel  the  going  is  easy  if  one  keeps  an  eye  on  the 
shallowing  water  at  the  bars.    A  sky-line  of  brown 


PASCO  TO  THE  DALLES  327 

mountains,  with  a  double-turreted  butte  as  their  most 
conspicuous  feature,  marks  the  point  where  the  Co- 
lumbia finally  turns  west  for  its  assault  on  the  Cas- 
cades and  its  plunge  to  the  Pacific.  That  bend  is  the 
boundary  of  the  fertile  plains  extending  from  the 
Yakima  to  the  Walla  AValla,  and  the  beginning  of  a 
new  series  of  gorges,  in  some  respects  the  grandest  of 
all.  The  matchless  panorama  of  the  Cascade  gorges 
is  a  fitting  finale  to  the  stupendous  scenic  pageant 
that  has  been  staged  all  the  way  from  the  glacial 
sources  of  the  Columbia. 

A  low  sandy  beach  just  above  the  mouth  of  the 
rather  insignificant  Walla  Walla  comes  pretty  near 
to  being  the  most  historically  important  point  on  the 
Columbia.  Here  Lewis  and  Clark  first  came  to  the 
waters  of  the  long-struggled-toward  Oregon;  here 
came  Fremont,  the  "Pathfinder;"  here  Thompson 
planted  his  pious  proclamation  claiming  all  of  the 
valley  of  the  Columbia  for  the  Northwest  Company ; 
and  by  here,  sooner  or  later,  passed  and  repassed 
practically  every  one  of  the  trappers,  missionaries, 
settlers  and  other  pioneers  who  were  finally  to  bring 
Oregon  permanently  under  the  Stars  and  Stripes. 

The  double-topped  butte,  an  outstanding  landmark 
for  voyageurs  for  a  hundred  years,  has  long  been 
called  "The  Two  Virgins."  The  story  is  told  locally 
of  a  Catholic  priest  who  saved  his  life  by  taking  ref- 
uge in  a  cave  between  the  castellated  turrets  during 
an  Indian  massacre,  but  who  got  in  rather  serious 
trouble  with  the  Church  afterwards  as  a  consequence 
of  sending  words  of  his  deliverance  by  a  French-Ca- 
nadian  half-breed   voyageur.     The   latter   got   the 


328  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

salient  details  of  the  story  straight,  but  neglected  to 
explain  that  the  two  virgins  were  mountains.  The 
result  was  that  the  unlucky  priest  narrowly  missed 
excommunication  for  saving  his  life  at  the  expense  of 
breaking  his  vows.  I  got  no  affidavit  with  the  story; 
but  local  "stock"  yarns  are  always  worth  preserving 
on  account  of  their  colour. 

There  were  a  number  of  big  black  rocks  where  the 
river  began  its  bend  to  the  west,  but  the  channel  to  the 
right  was  not  hard  to  follow.  Neither  did  Bull  Run 
Rapids,  a  few  miles  farther  down,  offer  any  difficul- 
ties. I  followed  the  steamer  channel  as  having  the 
swiftest  current,  but  could  have  passed  without 
trouble  on  either  side  of  it  in  much  quieter  water. 
Brown  and  terra-cotta-tinged  cliffs  reared  higher  and 
higher  to  left  and  right,  encroaching  closely  on  the 
river.  There  was  little  room  for  cultivation  at  any 
point,  and  often  the  railways  had  had  to  resort  to 
heavy  cutting  and  tunnelling  to  find  a  way  through 
some  jutting  rock  buttress.  There  were  no  trees,  and 
the  general  aspect  of  the  country  was  desolate  in  the 
extreme. 

It  was  toward  the  end  of  a  grey  afternoon  that  I 
headed  ImsJiallah  into  the  first  pitch  of  Umatilla 
Rapids.  The  sun  had  dissolved  into  a  slowly  thick- 
ening mist  about  three  o'clock,  and  from  then  on  the 
whole  landscape  had  been  gradually  neutralizing  itself 
by  taking  on  shade  after  shade  of  dull,  inconspicuous 
grey.  From  the  grey-white  mistiness  of  the  sky  to 
the  grey-green  murkiness  of  the  river  there  was  noth- 
ing that  contrasted  with  anything  else;  every  object 
was  blended,  dissolved,  all  but  quenched.    The  foam- 


PASCO  TO  THE  DALLES  329 

ruffles  above  even  the  sharpest  of  the  riffles  blurred 
like  the  streaking  of  clouded  marble  at  a  hundred 
feet,  and  it  took  the  livest  kind  of  a  lookout  to  avoid 
the  ones  with  teeth  in  them.  Neither  the  first  nor  the 
second  riffle  had  any  very  bad  water,  but  my  neck  was 
stiff  from  watching  over  my  shoulder  even  as  they 
were.  I  had  rather  intended  avoiding  this  trouble  by 
drifting  down  anything  that  looked  very  threatening 
stern  first,  but  that  would  have  involved  retrimming 
the  boat  and  greatly  reducing  her  speed.  If  I  was 
going  to  make  Umatilla  by  dark,  there  was  no  time 
to  lose. 

From  the  head  of  the  first  riffle  of  Umatilla  Rapids 
to  the  head  of  the  third  or  main  one  is  a  mile  and  a 
half.  There  was  a  slight  up-river  breeze  blowing  in 
the  mist,  and  the  heavy  rumble  of  the  big  fall  came 
to  my  ears  some  distance  above  the  opening  riffle. 
The  distant  roar  augmented  steadily  after  that,  and 
the  sharper  grind  of  the  more  imminent  riffles  was 
never  loud  enough  to  drown  it  out  entirely.  The 
fact  that  it  had  a  certain  "all  pervasive"  quality,  seem- 
ing to  fill  the  whole  of  the  gorge  with  its  heavy  beat, 
told  me  that  it  was  an  unusually  long  rapid,  as  well  as 
an  unusually  rough  one.  That,  it  seemed,  Was  about 
all  I  was  going  to  be  able  to  find  out.  'No  one  was  in 
sight  on  the  left  bank,  which  I  was  skirting,  and  the 
right  bank  was  masked  with  mist.  With  none  to  seek 
information  from,  and  with  not  enough  light  to  see 
for  myself,  the  alternatives  were  very  simple:  I 
could  either  land,  line  as  far  as  I  could  while  light 
lasted  and  then  seek  Umatilla  on  foot  for  the  night, 
or  I  could  take  my  chance  at  running  through.    It 


330  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

was  the  delay  and  uncertainty  sure  to  be  attendant 
upon  lining  that  was  the  principal  factor  in  deciding 
me  to  try  the  latter  course.  Also,  I  knew  that  there 
was  an  open  channel  all  the  way  through,  and  that  the 
rapid  was  a  comparatively  broad  and  shallow  one, 
rather  than  constricted  and  deep.  This  meant  that 
it  would  be  straight  white  water — a  succession  of 
broken  waves — I  was  going  into,  rather  than  heavy 
swirls  and  whirlpools;  just  the  water  in  which  the 
skiff  had  already  proved  she  was  at  her  best.  These 
points  seemed  to  minimize  the  risk  of  going  wrong  to 
a  point  where  the  chance  of  running  was  worth  taking 
for  the  time  and  trouble  it  would  save.  If  I  had  not 
known  these  things  in  advance,  I  should  never,  of 
course,  have  risked  going  into  so  strong  a  rapid  under 
such  conditions  of  light. 

I  shall  always  have  a  very  grateful  feeling  toward 
that  Pasco  ferry-man  for  those  few  words  he  dropped 
about  the  run  of  the  reef  and  the  set  of  the  current  at 
Umatilla  Rapid.  This  is  one  of  the  few  great  rapids 
I  have  ever  known  on  any  river  where  the  main  drift 
of  the  current  will  not  carry  a  boat  to  the  deepest 
channel.  This  is  due  to  the  fact  that  the  great  reef 
of  native  rock  which  causes  the  rapid  is  sufficiently 
submerged  even  at  middle  water  to  permit  a  consid- 
erable flow  directly  across  it.  The  consequence  of  this 
is  that  a  boat,  large  or  small,  which  follows  the  current 
and  does  not  start  soon  enough  working  over  toward 
the  point  where  a  channel  has  been  blasted  through 
the  reef,  is  almost  certain  to  be  carried  directly  upon 
the  latter.    This  has  happened  to  a  good  many  steam- 


PASCO  TO  THE  DALLES  331 

ers,  the  latest  having  been  wrecked  not  long  before 
my  voyage. 

With  a  rough  idea  of  the  lay  of  things  in  my  mind, 
I  had  edged  a  good  deal  farther  out  across  the  current 
than  would  have  been  the  case  had  I  been  trusting  to 
my  own  judgment  of  the  way  the  rapid  ought  to  de- 
velop in  the  light  of  my  past  experience.  The  smooth 
but  swiftly-flowing  water  to  the  left  looked  almost 
empty  of  threat,  and  it  was  not  until  I  was  within  a 
hundred  feet  of  the  barrier  that  I  saw  it  was  flowing 
directly  over  the  latter  and  went  tumbling  down  the 
farther  side  in  an  almost  straight  fall.  At  the  same 
instant  I  saw  that  I  was  still  heading  forty  or  fifty 
feet  to  the  left  of  where  the  "intake"  dipped  through 
the  break  in  the  reef.  Realizing  that  I  could  never 
make  it  by  heading  straight,  I  swung  the  skiff  round 
and  pulled  quartering  to  the  current  with  her  head 
up-stream.  Even  then  it  was  a  nearer  squeak  than  I 
like  to  think  of.  I  missed  the  middle  of  the  "V"  by 
ten  feet  as  I  swung  her  head  down-stream  again,  and 
as  the  racing  current  carried  her  up  against  the  back- 
wave  thrown  off  the  end  of  the  break  in  the  reef  she 
heeled  heavily  to  starboard,  like  an  auto  turning  on  a 
steeply-banked  track.  Then  she  shot  out  into  the 
big  white  combers  in  mid-channel  and  started  slap- 
banging  down  through  them.  It  looked  beastly  rough 
ahead,  but  in  any  event  it  was  better  than  hanging  up 
on  the  reef  at  the  outset.  We  were  going  to  have  run 
for  our  money  whatever  happened. 

The  only  precautions  there  had  been  time  to  take 
were  slipping  into  my  "Gieve"  and  throwing  all  my 


332  DOWN  THE  COLU]MBIA 

luggage  aft.  Half-inflated,  the  rubber-lined  jacket 
was  no  handicap  in  rowing,  and  the  tube  hung  ready 
to  receive  more  air  if  necessity  arose.  As  for  the  trim, 
it  had  been  my  snap  judgment  at  the  last  moment 
that  it  would  be  better  to  give  the  skiff  her  head  in  the 
rollers  that  I  kneic  were  coming,  and  let  her  take  her 
chance  in  being  down  by  the  stern  in  whirlpools  that 
might  never  materialize.  I  still  think  that  was  the 
best  thing  to  have  done  under  the  circumstances. 

Not  until  I  was  right  down  into  that  wild  wallow 
of  rock-churned  foam  was  there  a  chance  to  get  an 
idea  of  the  rather  remarkable  bedrock  formation 
which  is  responsible  for  making  Umatilla  Rapids  the 
worrisome  problem  they  have  always  been  for  river 
skippers.  After  piercing  the  black  basaltic  barrier 
of  the  reef,  the  channel  shoots  to  the  left  and  runs  for 
a  quarter  of  a  mile  or  more  (I  was  too  busy  to  judge 
distances  accurately)  right  along  the  foot  of  it.  With 
a  considerable  stream  of  water  cascading  over  the 
reef  at  almost  right  angles  to  the  channel,  a  queer  sort 
of  side-kick  is  thrown  into  the  waves  of  the  latter 
which  make  it  one  of  the  most  "unrhythmic"  rapids  I 
ever  ran.  ImsJiallah  pounded  horribly,  but  gave  not 
the  savagest  of  the  twisting  combers  a  chance  to  put 
anything  solid  over  her  high  held  head.  My  erratic 
pecking  strokes  did  not  find  green  water  often  enough 
to  give  her  much  way  over  the  current,  but  she  re- 
sponded instantly  every  time  I  dug  deep  to  throw  her 
head  back  after  she  had  been  buffeted  sideways  by 
an  arrogant  ruffian  of  a  roller. 

As  soon  as  I  saw  the  way  she  was  riding  the  rough- 
est of  the  water,  I  realized  that  the  only  chance  of  a 


PASCO  TO  THE  DALLES  333 

bad  mess-up  would  come  through  my  failure  to  keep 
her  head  to  the  enemy.  Knowing  this  wasn't  likely 
to  happen  unless  I  broke  an  oar,  I  eased  a  bit  on  my 
pulling  and  gave  just  a  quick  short-arm  jerk  now  and 
then  to  hold  her  steady.  She  was  never  near  to 
broaching-to,  and  I'm  mighty  glad  she  wasn't.  Uma- 
tilla is  the  sort  of  a  rapid  that  hasn't  quite  the  teeth  to 
get  the  best  of  a  carefully  handled  boat  that  is  running 
in  good  luck,  but  which  has  the  power,  with  a  mile  to 
spare,  to  grind  to  match-wood  any  craft  that  gets  into 
trouble  on  its  own  account.  It  was  an  eerie  run  that — 
with  the  snarling  cascade  of  the  reef  on  one  side,  the 
ghostly  dance  of  the  rollers  on  the  other,  and  the  im- 
penetrable grey  curtain  of  the  mist  blanking  every- 
thing beyond  a  radius  of  a  hundred  feet ;  but  Imshal- 
lah  went  through  it  with  her  head  in  the  air  and  came 
waltzing  out  into  the  swirls  below  as  cocky  as  a  part- 
ridge. Indeed,  that  was  just  the  trouble.  The  pair 
of  us  were  just  a  bit  too  cocky  over  the  way  we  had 
gone  it  blind  and  come  through  so  smartly.  It  re- 
mained for  a  couple  of  lesser  rapids  to  reduce  both 
of  us  to  a  proper  humility  of  spirit. 

I  had  been  prepared  to  make  a  quick  shift  to  the 
forward  thwart  in  case  there  was  a  bad  run  of  whirl- 
pools following  the  rapid,  and  so  bring  her  up  by  the 
stern.  This  did  not  prove  necessary,  however,  as  the 
rapidly  broadening  river  was  too  shallow  for  danger- 
ous under-currents.  A  short  run  in  slackening  water 
brought  me  to  the  town  of  Umatilla  just  as  the  lights 
were  beginning  to  twinkle  in  the  windows.  Landing 
in  the  quiet  water  below  a  short  stone  jetty,  I  left  my 
stuff  in  a  near-by  shack  and  sought  the  hotel.    The 


334  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

pool-room  "stove-decorators"  refused  to  believe  I  had 
come  through  the  rapid  until  I  described  it  to  them. 
Then  they  said  it  was  better  to  be  a  lucky  darnfool 
on   the   Columbia   than   an   unlucky    school-teacher. 
"School-teacher,"  it  appeared,  was  the  local  apotheo- 
sis of  Wisdom,  and  stood  at  the  opposite  pole  from 
"darnfool."     It  seems  that  there  had  been  two  male 
scliool-teachers  drowned  in  Umatilla  that  summer  and 
only  one  darnfool,  and  they  were  rather  put  out  at 
me  for  having  failed  to  even  up  the  score.    Then  they 
tried  to  spoil  my  evening  by  telling  me  all  the  things 
that  had  happened  to  people  in  Devil's  Run  Rapids, 
which  I  would  go  into  just  below  the  mouth  of  the 
river  the  first  thing  in  the  morning.     They  had  me 
rather  fussed  for  a  while,  too — until  they  told  one 
about  a  farmer  who,  after  having  had  his  launch  upset 
on  his  way  home  from  his  wedding,  swam  out  with  his 
bride  in  his  arms.    I  told  them  I'd  try  to  get  that  lusty 
swimmer  to  tow  me  through  Devil's  Run  in  the  morn- 
ing, and  turned  in  for  a  good  sleep. 

Umatilla  is  a  decrepit  little  old  town  that  knew  its 
best  days  away  back  in  the  last  century,  when  it  was 
the  head  of  steamer  navigation  on  the  Columbia  and 
the  terminus  of  the  freighting  route  to  Idaho  and 
eastern  Washington.  There  are  rich  irrigated  lands 
farther  up  the  Umatilla  River,  but  the  development 
of  these  seems  to  have  done  little  for  the  stagnating 
old  settlement  by  the  Columbia,  which  has  little  left 
but  its  historic  memories.  It  was  by  the  Umatilla 
that  the  rugged  Hunt  and  the  remnants  of  the  Astor 
overland  party  came  to  the  Columbia,  after  what  was 
perhaps  the  most  terrible  journey  ever  made  across 


PASCO  TO  THE  DALLES  335 

the  continent.  And  all  through  the  time  of  the  voya- 
geurs,  the  trappers  and  the  pioneers,  Umatilla  was 
only  less  important  as  a  halting  and  portage  point 
than  the  Cascades  and  the  Dalles. 

I  pulled  away  from  the  jetty  of  Umatilla  at  eight 
o'clock  in  the  morning  of  November  fifteenth.  The 
sky  was  clear  and  there  was  no  trace  of  the  mist  of 
the  previous  evening.  There  was  brilliant,  diamond- 
bright  visibility  on  the  river,  with  the  usual  early 
morning  mirage  effects,  due  to  the  chill  stratmn  of 
air  lying  close  to  the  water.  This  exaggerated  con- 
siderably the  height  of  distant  riffles,  lifting  them  up 
into  eye-scope  much  sooner  than  they  would  have 
been  picked  up  ordinarily.  I  put  on  my  "Gieve"  and 
blew  it  up  in  anticipation  of  a  stiff  fight  at  Devil's 
Run,  only  to  find  just  enough  rocks  and  riffles  there 
to  make  me  certain  of  locating  them.  I  could  see, 
however,  that  the  formation  was  such  that  there  might 
have  been  very  troublesome  water  there  at  higher,  and 
possibly  lower,  stages.  Out  of  charity  for  the  tellers 
of  a  good  many  awesome  tales  I  had  to  listen  to  in 
respect  of  rapids  I  subsequently  found  to  be  compar- 
atively innocuous,  I  am  inclined  to  believe  that  a  num- 
ber of  them  were  substantially  straight  accounts  of 
disasters  which  had  actually  occurred  in  flood  season, 
or  at  times  when  other  water  levels  than  those  I  en- 
countered made  the  riffles  in  question  much  more 
troublesome. 

I  had  an  easy  day  of  it  for  rapids,  but,  as  a  conse- 
quence of  the  comparatively  slow  water,  rather  a  hard 
one  for  pulling.  Canoe  Encampment  Rapids,  twenty 
miles  below  Devil's  Run,  gave  me  a  good  lift  for  a 


336  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

mile  or  more,  but  not  enough  to  make  much  of  a  res- 
pite from  the  oars  if  I  was  going  to  make  the  fifty 
miles  I  had  set  for  my  day's  run.  I  was  still  ten  miles 
short  of  that  at  four  o'clock  when  a  drizzling  rain  set- 
ting in  from  the  south-west  decided  me  to  land  for 
shelter  at  Hepburn  Junction,  on  the  left  bank.  That 
was  the  first  rain  I  had  encountered  since  passing  the 
Canadian  Boundary,  after  a  month  of  practically  con- 
tinuous storms.  There  was  nothing  but  a  railway 
station  at  the  Junction,  but  a  nearby  road-camp  of- 
fered the  chance  of  food  and  shelter.  The  young  con- 
tractor— he  was  doing  the  concrete  work  on  a  State 
Highway  bridge  at  that  point — eyed  my  bedraggled 
figure  somewhat  disapprovingly  at  first,  at  a  loss, 
apparently,  as  to  whether  I  was  a  straight  hobo  or 
merely  a  disguised  ])oot-legger.  An  instant  later  we 
had  recognized  each  other  as  football  opponents  of 
Los  Angeles-Pasadena  school-days.  His  name  was 
\\^alter  Rees,  of  a  family  prominent  among  early 
Southern  California  pioneers.  With  the  rain  patter- 
ing on  the  tent  roof,  we  talked  each  other  to  sleep  la- 
menting the  good  old  days  of  the  "flying  wedge"  and 
massed  play  in  football. 

It  was  clear  again  the  following  morning,  but  with 
a  mistiness  to  the  west  masking  Mount  Hood  and  the 
Cascades,  to  which  I  was  now  coming  very  near.  The 
cliffs  had  been  rearing  up  higher  and  higher  at  every 
mile,  great  walls  of  red-brown  and  black  rock  strongly 
suggestive,  in  their  rugged  barrenness,  of  the  but- 
tressed, turreted  and  columned  formation  through 
which  the  river  runs  below  the  mouth  of  the  Spokane. 
Owyhee,  Blalock  and  Four  O'clock  rapids  were  easy 


PASCO  TO  THE  DALLES  337 

running,  but  the  sustained  roar  which  the  slight  up- 
river  breeze  brought  to  my  ears  as  the  black,  right- 
angling  gorge  of  Rock  Creek  came  in  sight  was  fair 
warning  that  there  was  really  rough  water  ahead. 
Although  I  had  been  able  to  gather  very  little  infor- 
mation along  the  way,  the  fact  that  I  had  so  far  de- 
scended but  a  small  part  of  the  two  hundred  feet  of 
drop  between  Umatilla  and  Celilo  Falls  meant  that 
the  several  rapids  immediately  ahead  would  have  to 
make  up  for  the  loafing  the  Columbia  had  been  guilty 
of  for  the  last  sixty  miles. 

Taking  advantage  of  the  quiet  stretch  of  water  be- 
low Four  O'clock  Rapids,  I  went  all  over  the  skiff  as 
she  drifted  in  the  easy  current,  tuning  her  up  for  the 
slap-banging  she  could  not  fail  to  receive  in  the  long 
succession  of  sharp  riffles  which  began  at  Rock  Creek. 
In  tightening  up  the  brass  screws  along  the  gunwale, 
I  removed  and  threw  into  the  bottom  of  the  boat  both 
of  my  oar-locks.  When  I  started  to  restore  them  to 
place  as  the  roar  of  the  nearing  rapid  grew  louder,  I 
found  that  one  of  them — the  left — had  been  kicked 
out  of  reach  under  the  bottom-boards.  Rather  than 
go  to  the  trouble  of  tearing  up  the  latter  just  then,  I 
replaced  the  missing  lock  with  one  from  my  duffle- 
bag,  a  roughly-smithed  piece  of  iron  that  I  had  car- 
ried away  as  a  mascot  from  an  old  hatteau  at  Boat 
Encampment.  It  proved  quite  a  bit  too  snug  for  its 
socket,  besides  being  a  deal  wider  than  it  should  have 
been  for  the  shaft  of  my  light  oar.  There  was  a 
spoon  oar,  with  a  ring  lock,  under  the  thwarts,  but  I 
was  somewhat  chary  of  using  it  since  its  mate  had 
snapped  with  me  below  Rock  Island  Rapids. 


338  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

The  river  narrowed  sharply  above  Rock  Creek, 
and,  standing  on  a  thwart  as  the  skiff  drifted  down, 
I  saw  that  the  rapid  dropped  away  in  a  solid  stretch 
of  white  foam  tumbling  between  black  basaltic  walls. 
There  was  a  good,  stiff  fall,  but  it  was  reassuring  that 
I  could  see  right  away  to  the  end  of  the  white  water, 
which  did  not  appear  to  continue  around  the  ninety- 
degree  bend  at  the  foot.  It  was  just  the  sort  of  water 
Imshallah  was  at  her  best  in  running,  so  I  decided  it 
was  simply  a  matter  of  choosing  the  clearest  channel 
and  letting  her  go.  A  white  cross-barred  post  on  the 
mountainside  at  the  angle  of  the  bend  gave  me  the 
bearing  for  the  channel  a  minute  or  two  before  I 
made  out  the  dip  of  the  "intake."  Stowing  every- 
thing well  aft,  as  I  had  done  at  Umatilla,  I  took  up 
my  oars  and  put  her  straight  over  the  jade-green  tip 
of  the  "V." 

That  was  rough-and-rowdy  water,  and  no  mistake. 
Every  roller  meant  a  slam,  and  every  slam  meant  a 
shower-bath;  but  withal,  it  was  mostly  spray  that 
came  over  her  bows — nothing  really  to  bother  about. 
And  so  Iinshallah  would  have  run  it  right  through — 
had  not  a  sharp  dig  I  gave  with  my  left  oar  jerked 
the  latter  out  of  that  "open-faced"  Boat  Encamp- 
ment mascot  lock  and  sent  me  keeling  over  backwards. 
The  next  moment  she  was  wallowing,  beam-on,  into 
the  troughs  and  over  the  crests  of*  the  combers,  dip- 
ping green  water  at  every  roll. 

Recovering  my  seat  as  quickly  as  possible,  I  tried 
to  bring  her  head  up  again  by  backing  with  the  right 
oar.  She  swung  obediently  enough,  but  I  could  not 
hold  her  bow  down-stream  once  she  was  headed  right. 


PASCO  TO  THE  DALLES  339 

Rather  than  chance  that  "mascot"  oar-lock  again,  I 
tumbled  aft  and  did  what  I  could  with  the  paddle. 
Down  as  she  was  by  the  stern,  that  brought  her  head 
right  out  of  the  water  and  made  it  rather  hopeless  get- 
ting any  way  on  her.  She  tumbled  on  through  to  the 
foot  of  the  rapid  without  putting  a  gunwale  under 
again,  however,  a  circumstance  for  which  I  was  highly 
thankful.  She  already  had  five  or  six  inches  of  water 
in  her,  as  I  found  as  soon  as  I  began  to  bail.  It  is 
just  as  well  the  trouble  didn't  occur  at  the  head  of  the 
rapid.  We  were  half  way  down  when  I  ceased  to 
function,  and  Imshallali  had  about  all  she  wanted  to 
navigate  the  remainder.  I  was  also  duly  thankful 
that  there  was  nothing  more  than  a  few  bad  swirls  at 
the  foot  of  the  rapid.  Standing  on  her  tail  as  she 
was  after  I  plumped  down  in  the  stern  with  the 
paddle,  a  good  strong  whirlpool,  such  as  must  form 
at  that  sharp  bend  at  high-water,  would  have  made 
not  more  than  one  comfortable  mouthful  of  her. 

From  the  foot  of  Rock  Creek  Rapids  to  the  head 
of  Squally  Hook  Rapids  is  something  less  than  four 
miles  of  not  very  swift  water.  It  took  me  about  all 
the  time  the  boat  was  drifting  that  distance  to  get  her 
bailed  out  enough  to  retrieve  my  lost  oar-lock  from 
under  the  bottom-boards.  Squally  Hook,  I  could  see, 
was  much  the  same  sort  of  a  short,  sharp,  savage  rapid 
as  Rock  Creek.  There  was  the  same  restricted  "in- 
take," and  the  same  abrupt  bend  just  beyond  the  foot; 
only  below  Squally  Hook  the  river  turned  to  the  left, 
where  at  Rock  Creek  it  had  turned  to  the  right. 

The  sheer  two-thousand-foot  cliff  on  the  inside  of 
the  bend  that  gives  its  name  to  the  rapid  is  well  called 


340  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

Squally  Hook.  What  had  been  a  gentle  ten-miles- 
an-hour  breeze  on  the  river  above  began  resolving 
itself  into  a  succession  of  fitful  gusts  of  twenty  or 
thirty  as  I  approached  the  rock-walled  bend.  Even  a 
steady  head-wind  makes  steering  awkward  in  going 
into  a  rapid;  a  gusty  one  is  a  distinct  nuisance.  To 
avoid  the  necessity  of  any  sharp  change  of  course 
after  I  was  once  among  the  white-caps,  I  resolved  to 
use  every  care  in  heading  into  the  rapid  at  exactly  the 
right  place.  That  was  why,  when  I  became  aware 
that  two  girls  from  a  t arm-house  on  a  bench  above  the 
right  bank  were  motioning  me  imperiously  in  that 
direction,  I  swerved  sharply  from  the  course  I  had 
decided  upon  in  an  endeavour  to  locate  the  channel 
into  which  I  was  sure  they  were  trying  to  tell  me  to 
head.  Just  what  those  confounded  half-breed  Loreli 
were  really  driving  at  I  never  did  learn.  Perhaps 
they  had  apples  to  sell,  or  some  sweet  cider;  or  per- 
haps they  thought  I  had  some  cider  that  was  not 
sweet.  Perhaps  it  was  pure  sociability — the  desire  of 
a  bit  of  a  "talky-talk"  with  the  green-boated  voy- 
agcur.  At  any  rate,  they  were  certainly  not  trying 
to  pilot  me  into  a  clear  channel.  That  fact  walloped 
me  right  between  the  eyes  the  instant  I  discovered 
that  I  had  pulled  beyond  the  entrance  of  a  perfectly 
straight  channel  and  that  there  was  a  barely  sub- 
merged barrier  of  rock  blocking  the  river  all  the  way 
on  to  the  right  bank. 

That,  of  coui'se,  left  me  no  alternative  but  to  pull 
back  for  all  that  was  in  me  to  wait  the  "intake."  It 
was  a  very  similar  predicament  to  the  one  in  which  the 
mist  had  tricked  me  at  the  head  of  Umatilla;  only 


PASCO  TO  THE  DALLES  341 

there  I  had  room  to  make  the  channel  and  here  I 
didn't.  The  current,  running  now  hke  a  mill-race, 
carried  me  onto  the  reef  sixty  feet  to  the  right  of  the 
smooth  green  chute  of  the  "fairway." 

If  it  had  taken  half  an  hour  instead  of  half  a  sec- 
ond to  shoot  out  across  the  shoaling  shelf  of  that  froth- 
hidden  reef  there  might  have  been  time  for  a  goodly 
bit  of  worrying  anent  the  outcome.  As  it  was,  there 
was  just  the  sudden  thrill  of  seeing  the  bottom  of  the 
river  leaping  up  to  hit  the  bottom  of  the  boat,  the  in- 
stant of  suspense  as  she  touched  and  dragged  at  the 
brink,  and  then  the  dizzy  nose-dive  of  two  or  three 
feet  down  into  deeper  water.  It  was  done  so  quickly 
that  a  stroke  checked  by  the  rock  of  the  reef  was 
finished  in  the  up-boil  below  the  little  cascade.  With 
an  inch  or  two  less  of  water  she  might  have  hung  at 
the  brink  and  swung  beam-on  to  the  current,  which, 
of  course,  would  have  meant  an  instant  capsize. 
The  way  it  was,  she  made  a  straight  clean  jump  of  it, 
and  only  buried  her  nose  in  the  souse-hole  for  the 
briefest  part  of  a  second  when  she  struck.  The  rest 
was  merely  the  matter  of  three  hundred  yards  of 
rough  running  down  a  rock-clear  channel. 

The  authors  of  my  near-mess-up  came  capering 
down  the  bank  in  pursuit  as  I  swung  out  into  the 
smoothening  swirls,  but  I  only  shook  my  fist  at  them 
and  resumed  my  oars.  Darn  women,  anyway! — when 
a  man's  running  rapids,  I  mean. 

Now  one  would  have  thought  that  those  two  per- 
formances were  enough  for  one  afternoon,  especially 
as  both  were  very  largely  due  to  my  own  carelessness ; 
but  I  suppose  the  "trilogy  of  trouble"  had  to  be 


342  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

rounded  out  complete.  From  the  foot  of  Squally 
Hook  Rapids  to  the  head  of  Indian  Rapids  is  about 
three  miles.  The  water  became  ominously  slack  as  I 
neared  what  appeared  to  be  a  number  of  great  rock 
islands  almost  completely  barring  the  river.  It  was 
not  until  I  was  almost  even  with  the  first  of  them  that 
a  channel,  very  narrow  and  very  straight,  opened  up 
along  the  left  bank.  Various  other  channels  led  off 
among  the  islands,  but  with  nothing  to  indicate  how 
or  where  they  emerged.  That  flume-like  chute  down 
the  left  bank  was  plainly  the  way  the  steamers  went, 
and  certainly  the  quickest  and  most  direct  course  on 
down  the  river.  Peering  through  the  rocky  vista,  I 
could  see  a  rain  storm  racing  up  the  Colmnbia,  with 
the  grey  face  of  it  just  blotting  out  a  wedge-shaped 
gorge  through  the  southern  cliffs  which  I  knew  must 
be  the  mouth  of  the  John  Day.  That  storm  was 
another  reason  why  I  should  choose  the  shortest  and 
swiftest  channel.  There  ought  to  be  some  kind  of 
shelter  where  this  important  southern  tributary  met 
the  Columbia. 

Of  course,  I  knew  all  about  still  water  running  deep 
(which  was  of  no  concern  to  me)  and  "twisty"  (which 
was  of  considerable  concern) .  I  should  certainly  have 
given  more  thought  to  the  matter  of  trimming  for 
what  was  sure  to  be  waiting  to  snap  up  Imshallali  at 
the  foot  of  that  speeding  chute  of  green-black  water 
had  not  an  old  friend  of  mine  breezed  along  just  then. 
He  was  the  engineer  of  the  way  freight  on  the  "South- 
bank"  line.  We  had  been  exchanging  signals  in  pass- 
ing for  three  days  now — twice  on  his  down  run  and 


PASCO  TO  THE  DALLES  343 

once  on  his  up.  This  was  the  first  opportunity  I  had 
had  to  show  him  how  a  rapid  should  be  run,  and  I 
noted  with  gratification  that  he  appeared  to  be  slow- 
ing down  so  as  to  miss  none  of  the  fine  points.  On  my 
part,  dispensing  with  my  wonted  preliminary  "look- 
see,"  I  swung  hard  on  the  oars  in  an  effort  to  get  into 
the  swiftest  water  before  the  spectators  were  out  of 
sight. 

As  the  engine  drew  up  even  with  me,  I  balanced 
my  oars  with  my  right  hand  for  a  moment  and  waved 
the  engineer  greetings  with  my  left;  he,  in  turn,  ran 
the  locomotive  with  his  left  hand  and  waved  with  his 
right.  Then  I  saw  that  the  fireman  was  also  waving, 
and,  farther  back,  the  brakeman,  from  the  top  of  a 
car,  and  the  conductor  from  the  "lookout"  of  the 
caboose.  The  occupants  of  the  "dirigible  grandstand" 
at  the  Poughkeepsie  regattas  had  nothing  on  the 
crew  of  that  way  freight.  And  the  latter,  moreover, 
were  treated  to  a  burst  of  speed  such  as  no  man-pro- 
pelled boat  in  still  water  ever  came  close  to.  I  was 
not  pulling  over  four  or  five  miles  an  hour  myself,  but 
that  smooth,  steep,  unobstructed  chute  must  have 
been  spilling  through  its  current  at  close  to  twenty. 
In  a  couple  of  hundred  yards  I  pulled  up  three  or 
four  car-lengths  on  the  comparatively  slow-moving 
train,  and  I  was  still  gaining  when  a  sudden  'Hoot-a- 
too-tootr  made  me  stop  rowing  and  look  around.  I 
had  recognized  instantly  the  familiar  danger  signal, 
and  was  rather  expecting  to  see  a  cow  grazing  with 
true  bovine  nonchalance  on  the  weeds  between  the 
ties.    Instead,  it  was  the  engineer's  wildly  gesticulat- 


344  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

ing  arm  that  caught  my  hack-cast  eye.  He  was  point- 
ing just  ahead  of  me,  and  down — evidently  at  some- 
thing in  the  water. 

Then  I  saw  it  too — a  big  black  funnel-shaped  hole 
down  which  a  wide  ribbon  of  river  seemed  to  be  tak- 
ing a  sort  of  a  spiral  tumble.  It  was  that  entirely 
well-meant  toot-a-toot,  which  was  intended  to  prod 
me,  not  a  cow,  into  activity,  that  was  primarily  re- 
sponsible for  what  followed.  Had  I  not  ceased  row- 
ing on  hearing  it,  it  is  probable  that  the  skiff  would 
have  had  enough  way  when  she  did  strike  that 
whirlpool  to  carry  her  right  on  through.  As  it 
was  Imshallah  simply  did  an  undulant  glide  into 
the  watery  tentacles  of  the  lurking  octopus,  snug- 
gled into  his  breast  and  prepared  to  spend  the 
night  reeling  in  a  dervish  dance  with  him.  I  must 
do  the  jade  tlie  justice  of  admitting  that  she  had 
no  intention  of  outraging  the  proprieties  by  going 
any  further  than  a  nocturnal  terpsichorean  revel. 
Going  home  for  the  night  with  him  never  entered  her 
mind;  so  that  when  he  tried  to  pull  the  "Cave-Man 
stuff"  and  drag  her  down  to  his  under-water  grottoes, 
she  put  up  the  most  virtuous  kind  of  resistance. 
The  trouble  was  that  I  didn't  want  to  go  even  as  far 
as  she  did.  Dancing  was  the  last  thing  I  cared  for, 
with  that  rain-storm  and  night  coming  on.  Yet — at 
least  as  far  as  my  friends  on  the  way  freight  ever 
knew — an  all-night  Dause  iVApaclie  looked  very 
much  like  what  we  were  up  against;  for  I  recall  dis- 
tinctly that  when  the  train  was  disappearing  round 
the  next  bend  Imshallah,  her  head  thrown  ecstati- 
cally skyward,  was  still  spinning  in  circles,  while  I 


PASCO  TO  THE  DALLES  345 

continued  to  fan  the  air  with  my  oars  like  an  animated 
Dutch  windmill. 

It  was  a  mighty  sizeable  whirlpool,  that  black- 
mouthed  maelstrom  into  which  ImsliaUalis  suscepti- 
bility had  betrayed  both  of  us.  I  should  say  that 
it  was  twice  the  diameter  of  the  one  which  had  given 
us  such  a  severe  shaking  just  above  the  Canadian 
Boundarj^  and  with  a  "suck"  in  proportion.  What 
helped  the  situation  now,  however,  was  the  fact  that 
the  skiff  carried  rather  less  than  half  the  weight  she 
did  then.  At  the  rate  she  was  taking  water  over  the 
stern  during  that  first  attack,  she  could  not  have  sur- 
vived for  more  than  half  a  minute ;  now  she  was  riding 
so  much  more  buoyantly  that  she  was  only  dipping 
half  a  bucket  or  so  once  in  every  two  or  three  rounds. 
When  I  saw  that  she  could  probably  go  on  dancing 
for  an  hour  or  two  without  taking  in  enough  water  to 
put  her  under,  something  of  the  ludicrousness  of  the 
situation  began  to  dawn  on  me.  Missing  the  water 
completely  with  half  of  my  strokes,  and  only  dealing 
it  futile  slaps  with  the  rest,  I  was  making  no  more 
linear  progress  than  if  I  had  been  riding  a  merry-go- 
round.  I  didn't  dare  to  put  the  stern  any  lower  by 
sliding  down  there  and  trying  to  paddle  where  there 
was  water  to  be  reached.  Crowding  her  head  down  by 
working  my  weight  forward  finally  struck  me  as  the 
only  thing  to  do. 

With  the  forward  thwart  almost  above  my  head 
this  was  not  an  easy  consummation  to  effect,  especially 
with  an  oar  in  either  hand.  Luckily,  I  was  now  using 
the  "ring"  oar-locks,  so  that  they  came  along  on  the 
oars  when  I  unshipped  the  latter.    Standing  up  was. 


346  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

of  course,  out  of  the  question.  I  simply  slid  off  back- 
wards on  to  the  bottom  and  wriggled  forward  in  a 
sitting  position  until  I  felt  my  spine  against  the 
thwart.  That  brought  her  nose  out  of  the  clouds,  and 
she  settled  down  still  farther  when,  after  getting  my 
elbows  over  the  seat  behind  me,  I  worked  up  into  a 
rowing  position. 

The  whirlpool  was  spinning  from  right  to  left,  and 
one  quick  stroke  with  my  left  oar — against  the  cur- 
rent of  the  "spin,"  that  is — was  enough  to  shoot  her 
clear.  Bad  swirls  and  two  or  three  smaller  "twisters" 
made  her  course  a  devious  one  for  the  next  hundred 
yards,  but  she  never  swung  in  a  complete  revolution 
again.  I  pulled  into  smooth  water  just  as  the  first 
drops  of  the  storm  began  to  patter  on  the  back  of  my 
neck. 

The  first  riffle  of  John  Day  Rapids  sent  its  warn- 
ing growl  on  the  up-river  wind  before  I  was  a  quarter 
of  a  mile  below  the  whirlpool,  and  ahead  loomed  a 
barrier  of  rock  islands,  rising  out  of  the  white  foam 
churned  up  as  the  Columbia  raced  between  them.  I 
had  to  run  the  first  riffle — an  easy  one — to  make  the 
mouth  of  the  John  Day,  but  that  was  as  far  as  I  went. 
I  reckoned  there  had  been  quite  enough  excitement 
for  one  afternoon  without  poking  into  any  more  rough 
water  against  a  rain  and  head  wind.  Dropping  below 
the  gravel  bar  off  the  mouth  of  the  Day,  I  pulled 
fifty  yards  up-stream  in  a  quiet  current  and  moored 
Imsliallah  under  the  railway  bridge.  I  camped  for 
the  night  with  a  couple  of  motor  tourists  in  a  shack 
near  the  upper  end  of  the  bridge.  My  hosts  were  two 
genial  souls,  father  and  son,  enjoying  an  indefinite 


PASCO  TO  THE  DALLES  347 

spell  of  fishing,  hunting  and  trapping  on  a  stake  the 
former  had  made  in  the  sale  of  one  of  his  "prospects" 
in  southern  Oregon.  They  were  bluff,  big-hearted, 
genuine  chaps,  both  of  them,  and  we  had  a  highly- 
delightful  evening  of  yarning. 

It  was  clear  again  the  next  morning,  but  with  the 
barometer  of  my  confidence  jolted  down  several 
notches  by  what  had  occurred  the  previous  afternoon. 
I  pulled  across  the  river  and  sought  a  quieter  way 
through  the  second  riffle  of  John  Day  Rapids  than 
that  promised  by  the  boisterous  steamer  channel.  By 
devious  ways  and  sinuous,  I  wound  this  way  and  that 
among  the  black  rock  islands,  until  a  shallow  channel 
along  the  right  bank  let  me  out  of  the  maze  at  the 
lower  end.  This  waste  of  time  and  effort  was  largely 
due  to  funkiness  on  my  part,  and  there  was  no  neces- 
sity for  it.  The  steamer  channel  is  white  and  rough, 
with  something  of  a  whirlpool  on  the  left  side  at  the 
lower  end,  but  nothing  that  there  is  any  real  excuse 
for  avoiding.  The  third  riffle  was  nothing  to  bother 
about;  nor  did  Schofield's  Rapids,  two  miles  below, 
offer  any  difficulties.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  Adventure, 
having  had  its  innings,  was  taking  a  day  off,  leaving 
me  to  follow  the  Golden  Trail  of  Romance.  To-day 
was  "Ladies'  Day"  on  the  Columbia. 

Romance  first  showed  her  bright  eyes  at  a  little 
farm  on  the  right  bank,  three  miles  below  Schofield's 
Rapids.  Landing  here  to  ask  about  the  channel 
through  a  rather  noisy  rapid  beginning  to  boom  ahead, 
I  found  a  delectable  apple-cheeked  miss  of  about 
twelve  in  charge,  her  father  and  mother  having  gone 
across  to  Biggs  for  the  day.    She  was  in  sore  trouble 


348  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

at  the  moment  of  my  advent  because  her  newly-born 
brindle  bull  calf — her  really-truly  very  own — 
wouldn't  take  nourishment  properly.  Now  as  luck 
would  have  it,  teaching  a  calf  table-manners  chanced 
to  be  one  of  the  few  things  I  knew  al)out  stock-farm- 
ing. So  I  showed  her  how  to  start  in  by  letting  Cul- 
tus  (that  was  merely  a  temporary  name,  she  said,  be- 
cause he  was  so  bad)  munch  her  own  finger  for  a 
spell,  from  which,  by  slow  degrees,  the  lacteal  liaison 
with  "Old  Mooley"  was  established.  It  took  us  half 
an  hour  to  get  Cultus  functioning  on  all  fours,  and 
rather  longer  than  that  to  teach  her  collie,  tabby 
cat,  and  the  latter's  three  kittens  to  sit  in  a  row  and 
have  their  mouths  milked  into.  It  didn't  take  us  long 
to  exhaust  "Old  Mooley's"  milk  supply  at  that  game, 
and  when  I  finally  climbed  over  the  barnyard  fence 
on  the  way  down  to  my  boat,  poor  Cultus  was  left 
butting  captiously  at  an  empty  udder.  "Apple 
Cheek"  rather  wanted  me  to  stay  until  her  father 
came  back,  saying  that  he  had  gone  to  Biggs  to  get 
a  'breed  for  a  hired  man,  and  that,  if  he  didn't  get 
the  'breed,  maybe  I  would  do.  She  almost  burst  into 
tears  with  shame  when  I  told  her  I  was  a  moving  pic- 
ture actor  seeking  rest  and  local  colour  on  the  Colum- 
bia. "You  a  actor,  and  I  made  you  milk  'Old 
Mooley!'  "  she  sobbed;  and  it  took  all  my  lunch  ration 
of  milk  chocolate  to  bring  back  her  smile.  Then,  like 
the  Scotch  bride  at  Windermere,  she  asked  me  if  I  was 
Bill  Hart.  Somehow,  I  wasn't  quite  base  enough  to 
tell  her  a  concrete  lie  like  that ;  so  I  compromised  with 
a  comparative  abstraction.  I  was  a  rising  star  in  the 
movie  firmament,  I  said;  an  eclectic,  taking  the  best 


PASCO  TO  THE  DALLES  349 

of  all  the  risen  stars,  of  whom  much  would  be  heard 
later.  She  was  still  pondering  ''eclectic''  when  I 
pushed  off  into  the  current.  Bless  your  heart,  little 
"Apple  Cheek,"  I  hope  you  didn't  get  a  spanking  for 
wasting  all  of  Cultus'  dinner  on  the  dogs  and  cats 
and  the  side  of  the  barn!  You  were  about  the  first 
person  I  met  on  the  Columbia  who  didn't  accuse  me 
of  being  a  boot-legger,  and  tlxe  only  one  who  believed 
me  hot  off  the  bat  when  I  said  I  was  a  movie  star. 

The  rapid  ahead  became  noisier  as  I  drew  nearer, 
and  when  I  saw  it  came  from  a  reef  which  reached 
four-fifths  of  the  way  across  the  river  from  the  left 
bank,  I  pulled  in  and  landed  at  Biggs  to  inquire  about 
the  channel.  The  first  man  I  spoke  to  called  a  second, 
and  the  latter  a  third,  and  so  on  ad  infinitum.  Pretty 
near  to  half  the  town  must  have  been  gathered  at  the 
railway  station  giving  me  advice  at  the  end  of  a  quar- 
ter of  an  hour.  Each  of  them  had  a  different  sugges- 
tion to  make,  ranging  from  dragging  through  a  half- 
empty  back  channel  just  below  the  town  to  taking 
the  boat  out  and  running  it  down  the  track  on  a 
push-cart.  As  they  all  were  agreed  that  the  steamers 
used  to  go  down  the  opposite  side,  I  finally  decided 
that  would  be  the  best  way  through.  Not  to  run  too 
much  risk  of  being  carried  down  onto  the  reef  in  pull- 
ing across,  I  lined  and  poled  a  half  mile  up-stream 
before  pushing  off.  Once  over  near  the  right  bank, 
I  found  a  channel  broad  and  deep  enough  to  have  run 
at  night. 

A  couple  of  miles  below  Biggs  the  Columbia  is 
divided  by  a  long  narrow  rocky  island.  The  deep, 
direct  channel  is  that  to  the  right,  and  is  called  Hell 


350  DOWN  THE  COLUINIBIA 

Gate — the  third  gorge  of  that  hackneyed  name  I  had 
encountered  since  pushing  off  from  Beavermouth. 
Possibly  it  was  because  I  was  fed-up  with  the  name 
and  all  it  connoted  that  I  avoided  this  channel;  more 
likely  it  was  because  Romance  was  at  the  tow-line. 
At  any  rate,  I  headed  into  the  broad  shallow  channel 
that  flows  by  the  mouth  of  the  River  Des  Chutes.  It 
was  up  this  tumultuous  stream  that  Fremont,  after 
camping  at  the  Dalles  and  making  a  short  boat  voy- 
age below,  started  south  over  the  mountains  in  search 
of  the  mythical  river  that  was  supposed  to  drain  from 
the  Utah  basin  to  the  Pacific  in  the  vicinity  of  San 
Francisco — one  of  the  indomitable  "Pathfinder's" 
hardest  journeys. 

Just  beyond  where  the  River  of  the  Falls,  true  to 
name  to  the  last,  came  cascading  into  the  Columbia, 
Romance  again  raised  her  golden  head — this  time  out 
of  the  steam  rising  above  an  Indian  "Turkish-bath." 
The  first  time  I  had  found  her  in  the  guise  of  a  twelve- 
year-old;  this  time  it  was  more  like  a  hundred  and 
twelve.  One  can't  make  certain  within  a  year  or  two 
about  a  lady  in  a  Turkish-bath ;  it  wouldn't  be  seemly 
even  to  try  to  do  so.  Pulling  in  close  to  the  left  bank 
to  look  at  some  queer  mud-plastered  Indian  wickiups, 
a  rush  of  steam  suddenly  burst  from  the  side  of  the 
nearest  one,  and  out  of  that  spreading  white  cloud, 
rising  like  Aphrodite  from  the  sea-foam,  emerged 
the  head  and  shoulders  of  an  ancient  squaw.  She  was 
horribly  old — literally  at  the  sans  eyes,  sans  hair,  sans 
teeth,  sans  everything  (including  clothes)  stage. 
Cackling  and  gesticulating  in  the  rolling  steam,  she 


PASCO  TO  THE  DALLES  351 

was  the  belle  ideal  of  the  witch  of  one's  fancy,  mutter- 
ing incantations  above  her  boihng  cauldron. 

Fremont,  in  somewhat  humorous  vein,  tells  of  vis- 
iting an  Indian  camp  in  this  vicinity  on  the  Columbia, 
and  of  how  one  of  the  squaws  who  had  rushed  forth  in 
complete  deshabille  on  hearing  the  voices  of  strangers, 
"properized"  herself  at  the  last  moment  by  using  her 
papoose — as  far  as  it  would  go — as  a  shield.  But 
this  old  "Aphrodite"  I  had  flushed  from  cover  was  so 
old  that,  if  her  youngest  child  had  been  ready  to  hand, 
and  that  latter  had  had  one  of  her  own  children  within 
reach,  and  this  third  one  had  had  a  child  available,  I 
am  certain  that  still  another  generation  or  two  would 
have  had  to  be  descended  before  a  papoose  snfficiently 
young  enough  to  make  "properization"  proper  would 
have  been  found.  I  trust  I  make  that  clear.  And 
when  you  have  visualized  it,  isn't  it  a  funny  pyramid? 

With  two  or  three  more  "Aphrodites"  beginning  to 
bubble  up  through  the  steam,  it  is  just  possible  that 
some  such  an  ocular  barrage  actually  was  in  process 
of  formation;  but  I  think  not.  My  hard -plied  oars 
had  hardly  lengthened  my  interval  to  much  over  fifty 
yards,  when  the  whole  lot  of  them  trooped  down  to  the 
river — steaming  amazingly  they  were  at  the  touch  of 
the  sharp  early  winter  air — and  plunged  into  the  icy 
water.  I  learned  later  that  this  "sweat-bath"  treat- 
ment is  the  favourite  cure-all  with  the  Indians  of  that 
part  of  the  Columbia  Basin. 

Where  the  left-hand  channel  returned  to  the  main 
Columbia  a  mile  or  more  below  the  mouth  of  the 
River  Des  Chutes  I  encountered  an  extensive  series 


352  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

of  rock-reefs  which,  until  I  drew  near  them,  seemed  to 
block  the  way  completely.  It  was  a  sinuous  course  I 
wound  in  threading  my  way  through  the  ugly  basal- 
tic out-croppings,  but  the  comparatively  slow  water 
robbed  it  of  any  menace.  Once  clear  of  the  rocks,  I 
found  myself  at  the  head  of  the  long,  lake-like  stretch 
of  water  backed  up  above  Celilo  Falls.  The  low  rum- 
ble of  the  greatest  cataract  of  the  lower  Columbia 
was  already  pulsing  in  the  air,  while  a  floating  cloud 
of  "water-smoke,"  white  against  the  encroaching 
cliffs,  marked  its  approximate  location.  I  was  at  last 
approaching  the  famous  "long  portage"  of  the  old 
voyageurs,  a  place  noted  (in  those  days)  for  the  worst 
water  and  the  most  treacherous  Indians  on  the  river. 
Now,  however,  the  Indians  no  longer  blocked  the  way 
and  exacted  toll,  while  the  portage  had  been  bridged 
by  a  Government  canal.  I  caught  the  loom  of  the 
head-gate  of  the  latter  about  the  same  time  that  the 
bridge  of  the  "North-Bank"  branch  line,  which  spans 
the  gorge  below  the  falls,  began  rearing  its  blurred 
fret-work  above  the  mists.  Then,  once  again,  Ro- 
mance. "Ladies'  Day"  was  not  yet  over.  As  I 
pulled  in  toward  the  entrance  to  the  canal,  at  the  left 
of  the  head  of  the  falls,  I  observed  a  very  gaily- 
blanketed  dame  dancing  up  and  down  on  the  bank  and 
gesticulating  toward  the  opposite  side  of  the  river. 
As  I  landed  and  started  to  pull  the  skiff  up  on  the 
gravelly  beach,  she  came  trotting  down  to  entreat,  in 
her  best  "Anglo-Chinook,"  that  I  ferry  her  to  the 
opposite  bank,  where  her  home  was,  and,  where,  ap- 
parently, she  was  long  overdue.  She  wasn't  a  beggar, 
she  assured  me,  but — jingling  her  beaded  bag  under 


PASCO  TO  THE  DALLES  353 

my  nose — was  quite  willing  to  pay  me  "Myu  cJiicka- 
moiv"  for  my  services.  Nor  was  she  unduly  persistent. 
No  sooner  had  I  told  her  that  I  was  in  a  "hiyu  rush" 
and  hadn't  the  time  just  then  to  be  a  squire  of  dames, 
than  she  bowed  her  head  in  stoical  acquiescence  and 
went  back  to  her  waving  and  croaking.  It  was  that 
futile  old  croak  (with  not  enough  power  behind  it  to 
send  it  a  hundred  yards  across  a  mile-wide  river)  that 
caved  my  resolution.  Shoving  Imshallali  back  into 
the  water,  I  told  her  to  pile  in. 

And  so  Romance  drew  near  to  me  again,  this  time 
perched  up  in  the  long-empty  stern-sheets  of  my 
boat.  This  one  was  neither  an  infant  nor  a  centu- 
rienne,  but  rather  a  fair  compromise  between  the  two. 
Nor  was  she  especially  fair  nor  especially  compromis- 
ing (one  couldn't  expect  that  of  a  sixty-year-old 
squaw)  ;  but  she  was  the  most  trusting  soul  I  ever 
met,  and  that's  something.  The  falls  were  thundering 
not  fifty  yards  below — near  enough  to  wet  us  with 
their  up-blown  spray, — and  yet  not  one  word  of  warn- 
ing did  she  utter  about  giving  the  brink  a  wide  birth 
in  pulling  across.  Not  that  I  needed  such  a  warn- 
ing, for  the  first  thing  I  did  was  to  start  pulling  up- 
stream in  the  slack  water;  but,  all  the  same,  it  was  a 
distinct  compliment  to  have  it  omitted.  As  it  turned 
out,  there  was  nothing  to  bother  about,  for  the  cur- 
rent was  scarcely  swifter  in  mid-stream  than  along 
the  banks.  It  was  an  easy  pull.  Romance  beamed 
on  me  all  the  way,  and  once,  when  one  of  her  stubby 
old  toes  came  afoul  of  my  hob-nailed  boot,  she  bent 
over  and  gave  a  few  propitiary  rubs  to — the  boot 
...  as  if  that  had  lost  any  cuticle.    And  at  parting, 


354  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

when  I  waved  her  money-bag  aside  and  told  her  to 
keep  her  chickamon  to  spend  on  the  movies,  she  came 
and  patted  me  affectionately  on  the  shoulder,  repeat- 
ing over  and  over  "Close  tum-tiim  mika!"  And  that, 
in  Chinook,  means:  "You're  very  much  all  right!" 
As  far  as  I  can  remember,  that  is  the  only  unqualified 
praise  I  ever  had  from  a  lady — one  of  that  age,  I 
mean.  Squiring  squaws — especially  dear  old  souls 
like  that  one — is  a  lot  better  fun  than  a  man  would 
think. 

It  was  four  o'clock  when  I  turned  u^)  at  the  lock- 
master's  house  at  Celilo,  and  then  to  find  that  that 
worthy  had  just  taken  his  gun  and  gone  off  up  on  the 
cliffs  to  try  and  bag  a  goose.  As  it  would  probably 
be  dark  before  he  returned,  his  v/ife  reckoned  I  had 
better  put  up  with  them  for  the  night  and  make  an 
early  start  through  the  Canal  the  following  morning. 
The  lock-master,  a  genial  Texan,  came  down  with  his 
goose  too  late  it  get  it  ready  for  supper,  but  not  to  get 
it  picked  that  night.  Indeed,  we  made  rather  a  gala 
occasion  of  it.  "Mistah"  Sides  got  out  his  fiddle  and 
played  "The  Arkansaw  Traveller"  and  "Turkey  in 
the  Straw,"  the  while  his  very  comely  young  wife  ac- 
companied on  the  piano  and  their  two  children,  the 
village  school-marm  and  myself  collaborated  on  the 
goose.  It  was  a  large  bird,  but  many  hands  make 
light  work;  that  is,  as  far  as  getting  the  feathers  off 
the  goose  was  concerned.  Cleaning  up  the  kitchen 
was  another  matter.  As  it  was  the  giddy  young 
school-teacher  who  started  the  trouble  by  putting 
feathers  down  my  neck,  I  hope  "Missus"  Sides  made 
that  demure-eyed  minx  swab  down  decks  in  the  morn- 


LIFTED  DRAWBRIDGE  ON  CELILO  CANAL    (above) 
TUMWATER  GORGE  OF  THE  GRAND  DALLES    iheloiv) 


2S 


PASCO  TO  THE  DALLES  355 

ing  before  she  went  to  teach  the  young  idea  how  to 
shoot. 

There  is  no  lock  at  the  head  of  the  Celilo  Canal, 
but  a  gate  is  maintained  for  the  purpose  of  regulating 
flow  and  keeping  out  drift.  Sides,  silhouetted  against 
the  early  morning  clouds,  worked  the  gates  and  let 
me  through  into  the  narrow,  concrete-walled  canal, 
down  which  I  pulled  with  the  thunder  of  the  falls  on 
one  side  and  on  the  other  the  roar  of  a  passing  freight. 
The  earth-shaking  rumbles  died  down  presently,  and 
beyond  the  bend  below  the  railway  bridge  I  found 
myself  rowing  quietly  through  the  shadow  of  the 
great  wall  of  red-black  cliffs  that  dominate  the  Dalles 
from  the  south. 

Celilo  Falls  is  a  replica  on  a  reduced  scale  of  the 
Horse-shoe  cataract  at  Niagara.  At  middle  and 
low-water  there  is  a  drop  of  twenty  feet  here,  but  at 
the  flood-stage  of  early  summer  the  fall  is  almost 
wiped  out  in  the  lake  backed  up  from  the  head  of  the 
Tumwater  gorge  of  the  Dalles.  The  Dalles  then 
form  one  practically  continuous  rapid,  eight  or  nine 
miles  in  length,  with  many  terrific  swirls  and  whirl- 
pools, but  with  all  rocks  so  deeply  submerged  that  it 
is  possible  for  a  well-handled  steamer  to  run  through 
in  safety — provided  she  is  lucky.  With  the  comple- 
tion of  the  Canal  this  wildest  of  all  steamer  runs  was 
no  longer  necessary,  but  in  the  old  days  it  was  at- 
tempted a  number  of  times  when  it  was  desired  to  take 
some  craft  that  had  been  constructed  on  the  upper 
river  down  to  Portland.  The  first  steamer  was  run 
through  successfully  in  May,  1866,  by  Captain  T.  J. 
Stump,  but  the  man  who  became  famous  for  his  sue- 


35G  DOWN  THE  COLUIMBIA 

cess  in  getting  away  with  tJiis  dare-devil  stunt  was 
Captain  James  Troup,  perhaps  the  greatest  of  all 
Columbia  skippers.  Professor  W.  D.  Lyman  gives 
the  following  graphic  account  of  a  run  through  the 
Dalles  with  Captain  Troup,  on  the  D.  S.  Baker,  in 
1888. 

"At  that  strange  point  in  the  river,  the  whole  vast  volume 
is  compressed  into  a  channel  but  one  hundred  and  sixty  feet 
wide  at  low  water  and  much  deeper  than  wide.  Like  a  huge 
mill-race  the  current  continues  nearly  straight  for  two  miles, 
when  it  is  hurled  with  frightful  force  against  a  massive  bluff. 
Deflected  from  the  bluff,  it  turns  at  a  sharp  angle  to  be 
split  asunder  by  a  low  reef  of  rock.  When  the  Balcer  was 
drawn  into  the  suck  of  the  current  at  the  head  of  the  'chute* 
she  swept  down  the  channel,  which  was  almost  black,  with 
streaks  of  foam,  to  the  bluif,  two  miles  in  four  minutes. 
There  feeling  the  tremendous  refluent  wave,  she  went  careen- 
ing over  toward  the  sunken  reef.  The  skilled  captain  had  her 
perfectly  in  hand,  and  precisely  at  the  right  moment  rang  the 
signal  bell,  'Ahead,  full  speed,'  and  ahead  she  went,  just 
barely  scratcliing  her  side  on  the  rock.  Thus  close  was  it 
necessary  to  calculate  distance.  If  the  steamer  had  struck 
the  tooth-like  point  of  the  reef  broadside  on,  she  would  have 
been  broken  in  two  and  carried  in  fragments  on  either  side. 
Having  passed  tliis  danger  point,  she  ghded  into  the  beautiful 
calm  bay  below  and  the  feat  was  accomplished." 

There  is  a  fall  of  eighty-one  feet  in  the  twelve  miles 
from  the  head  of  Celilo  Falls  to  the  foot  of  the  Dalles. 
This  is  the  most  considerable  rate  of  descent  in  the 
whole  course  of  the  Columbia  in  the  United  States, 
though  hardly  more  than  a  third  of  that  over  stretches 


PASCO  TO  THE  DALLES  357 

of  the  Big  Bend  in  Canada.  It  appeared  to  be  custom- 
ary for  the  old  voyageii^rs  to  make  an  eight  or  ten 
miles  portage  here,  whether  going  up  or  down  stream, 
though  there  were  doubtless  times  when  their  big 
hatteaucc  were  equal  to  running  the  Dalles  below 
Celilo.  I  climbed  out  and  took  hurried  surveys  of 
both  Tumwater  and  Five-Mile  (sometimes  called 
"The  Big  Chute")  in  passing,  and  while  they  ap- 
peared to  be  such  that  I  would  never  have  consid- 
ered taking  a  chance  with  a  skiff  in  either  of  them, 
it  did  look  as  though  a  big  double-ender,  with  an  expe- 
rienced crew  of  oarsmen  and  paddlers,  would  have 
been  able  to  make  the  run.  That  was  a  snap  judg- 
ment, formed  after  the  briefest  kind  of  a  "look-see," 
and  it  may  well  be  that  I  was  over  optimistic. 

The  Celilo  Canal,  which  was  completed  by  the  Gov- 
ernment about  five  years  ago,  is  eight  and  a  half  miles 
long,  has  a  bottom  width  of  sixty-five  feet,  and  a 
depth  of  eight  feet.  It  has  a  total  lift  of  eighty  feet, 
of  which  seventy  are  taken  by  two  locks  in  flight  at 
the  lower  end.  That  this  canal  has  failed  of  its  ob- 
ject— that  of  opening  up  through  navigation  between 
tide-water  and  the  upper  Columbia — is  due  to  no  de- 
fect of  its  own  from  an  engineering  standpoint,  but 
rather  to  the  fact  that,  first  the  railway,  and  now  the 
truck,  have  made  it  impossible  for  river  steamers  to 
pay  adequate  returns  in  the  face  of  costly  operation 
and  the  almost  prohibitive  risks  of  running  day  after 
day  through  rock-beset  rapids.  There  is  not  a 
steamer  running  regularly  on  the  Columbia  above 
the  Dalles  to-day.  The  best  service,  perhaps,  which 
the  Celilo  Canal  rendered  was  the  indirect  one  of 


358  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

forcing  a  very  considerable  reduction  of  railway 
freight  rates.  That  alone  is  said  to  liave  saved  the 
shippers  of  eastern  Oregon  and  Washington  many 
times  the  cost  of  this  highly  expensive  undertaking. 

T  pulled  at  a  leisurely  gait  down  the  Canal,  stop- 
ping, as  I  have  said,  at  Tumwater  and  Five-Mile, 
and  at  the  latter  giving  the  lock -master  a  hand  in 
dropping  Imshallah  down  a  step  to  the  next  level. 
Rowing  past  a  weird  "fleet"  of  laid-up  salmon-wheels 
in  the  Big  Eddy  Basin,  I  sheered  over  to  the  left  bank 
in  response  to  a  jovial  hail,  and  found  myself  shaking 
hands  with  Captain  Stewart  Winslow,  in  command  of 
the  Government  dredge,  Umatilla,  and  one  of  the 
most  experienced  skippers  on  the  upper  river.  He 
said  that  he  had  been  following  the  progress  of  my 
voyage  by  the  papers  with  a  good  deal  of  interest, 
and  had  been  on  the  lookout  to  hold  me  over  for  a 
yarn.  As  I  was  anxious  to  make  the  Dalles  that 
night,  so  as  to  get  away  for  an  early  start  on  the 
following  morning,  he  readily  agreed  to  join  me  for 
the  run  and  dinner  at  the  hotel. 

While  Captain  Winslow  was  making  a  hurried 
shift  of  togs  for  the  river,  I  had  a  brief  but  highly 
interesting  visit  with  Captain  and  INIrs.  Saunders. 
Captain  Saunders,  who  is  of  the  engineering  branch 
of  the  army,  has  been  in  charge  of  the  Celilo  Canal 
for  a  number  of  years.  Mrs.  Saunders  has  a  very 
Jarge  and  valuable  collection  of  Indian  relics  and 
curios,  and  at  the  moment  of  my  arrival  was  follow- 
ing with  great  interest  the  progress  of  a  State  High- 
way cut  immediately  in  front  of  her  door,  which  was 
uncovering,  evidently  in  an  old  graveyard,  some  stone 


PASCO  TO  THE  DALLES  359 

mortars  of  unusual  size  and  considerable  antiquity. 
When  Captain  Winslow  was  ready,  we  went  down 
to  the  skiff,  and  pulled  along  to  the  first  lock.  With 
Captain  Saunders  and  a  single  helper  working  the 
machinery,  passing  us  down  to  the  second  lock  and 
on  out  into  the  river  was  but  the  matter  of  a  few 
minutes. 

Big  Eddy  must  be  rather  a  fearsome  hole  at  high 
water,  but  below  middle  stage  there  is  not  enough 
power  behind  its  slow-heaving  swirls  to  make  them 
troublesome.  It  was  a  great  relief  to  have  a  com- 
petent river-man  at  the  paddle  again,  and  my  rather 
over-craned  neck  was  not  the  least  beneficiary  by  the 
change.  The  narrows  at  Two-Mile  were  interesting 
rather  for  what  they  might  be  than  what  they  were. 
Beyond  a  lively  snaking  about  in  the  conflicting  cur- 
rents, it  was  an  easy  passage  through  to  the  smooth 
water  of  the  broadening  river  below.  One  or  two 
late  salmon-wheels  plashed  eerily  in  the  twilight  as 
we  ran  past  the  black  cliffs,  but  fishing  for  the  season 
was  practically  over  weeks  before.  We  landed  just 
above  the  steamer  dock  well  before  dark,  beached  the 
skiff,  stowed  my  outfit  in  the  warehouse,  and  reached 
the  hotel  in  time  to  avoid  an  early  evening  shower. 
Captain  Winslow  had  to  dine  early  in  order  to  catch 
his  train  back  to  Big  Eddy,  but  we  had  a  mighty 
good  yarn  withal. 


CHAPTER  XIV 

THE    HOME    STRETCH 

The  Dalles  was  the  largest  town  I  touched  on  the 
Cohinibia,  and  one  of  the  most  attractive.  Long  one 
of  the  largest  wool-shipping  centres  of  the  United 
States,  it  has  recently  attained  to  considerable  im- 
portance as  a  fruit  market.  It  will  not,  however, 
enter  into  anything  approaching  the  full  enjoyment 
of  its  birthright  until  the  incalculably  enormous 
power  possibilities  of  Celilo  Falls  and  the  Dalles 
have  been  developed.  So  far,  as  at  every  other  point 
along  the  Columbia  with  the  exception  of  a  small 
plant  at  Priest  Rapids,  nothing  has  been  done  along 
this  line.  When  it  is.  The  Dalles  will  be  in  the  way 
of  becoming  one  of  the  most  important  industrial 
centres  of  the  West. 

In  the  days  of  the  voyageurs  The  Dalles  was  no- 
torious for  the  unspeakably  treacherous  Indians  who 
congregated  there  to  intimidate  and  plunder  all  who 
passed  that  unavoidable  portage.  They  were  lying, 
thieving  scoundrels  for  the  most  part,  easily  intimi- 
dated by  a  show  of  force  and  far  less  prone  to  stage 
a  real  fight  than  their  more  warlike  brethren  who 
disputed  the  passage  at  the  Cascades.  That  this 
"plunderbund"  tradition  is  one  which  the  present- 
day  Dalles  is  making  a  great  point  of  living  down, 
I  had  conclusive  evidence  of  through  an  incident 
that  arose  in  connection  with  my  hotel  bill.     I  had 

360 


THE  HOME  STRETCH  361 

found  my  room  extremely  comfortable  and  well  ap- 
pointed, so  that  the  bill  presented  for  it  at  my  de- 
parture, far  from  striking  me  as  unduly  high,  seemed 
extremely  reasonable.  I  think  I  may  even  have  said 
something  to  that  effect ;  yet,  two  days  later  in  Port- 
land, I  received  a  letter  containing  an  express  order 
for  one  dollar,  and  a  note  saying  that  this  was  the 
amount  of  an  unintentional  overcharge  for  my  room. 
That  was  characteristic  of  the  treatment  I  received 
from  first  to  last  in  connection  with  my  small  finan- 
cial transactions  along  the  way.  I  never  dreamed 
that  there  were  still  so  many  people  in  the  world 
above  profiteering  at  the  expense  of  the  passing 
tourist  until  I  made  my  Columbia  voyage. 

I  had  intended,  by  making  an  early  start  from 
The  Dalles,  to  endeavour  to  cover  the  forty  odd  miles 
to  the  head  of  the  Cascades  before  dark  of  the  same 
day.  Two  things  conspired  to  defeat  this  ambitious 
plan:  first,  some  unexpected  mail  which  had  to  be 
answered,  and,  second,  my  equally  unexpected  book- 
ing of  a  passenger — a  way  passenger  who  had  to  be 
landed  well  short  of  the  Cascades.  Just  as  I  was 
cleaning  up  the  last  of  my  letters,  the  hotel  clerk 
introduced  me  to  the  "Society  Editor"  of  The  Dalles 
Chronicle,  who  wanted  an  interview.  I  told  her  that 
I  was  already  two  hours  behind  schedule,  but  that  if 
she  cared  to  ride  the  running  road  with  me  for  a  while, 
she  could  have  the  interview,  with  lunch  thrown  in, 
on  the  river.  She  accepted  with  alacrity,  but  begged 
for  half  an  hour  to  clean  up  her  desk  at  the  Chronicle 
office  and  change  to  outdoor  togs.  Well  within  that 
limit,  she  was  back  again  at  the  hotel,  flushed,  pant- 


362  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

ing  and  pant-ed,  and  announced  that  she  was  ready. 
Picking  uj)  a  few  odds  and  ends  of  food  at  the  near- 
est grocery,  we  went  down  to  the  dock,  where  I 
launched  and  loaded  up  Imshallah  in  time  to  push 
off  at  ten  o'clock.  I  had,  of  course,  given  up  all  idea 
of  making  the  Cascades  that  day,  and  reckoned  that 
Hood  River,  about  twenty-five  miles,  would  be  a  com- 
fortable and  convenient  halting  place  for  the  night. 
And  so  it  would  have  been.   .    .    . 

I  don't  remember  whether  or  not  we  ever  got  very 
far  with  the  "interview,"  but  I  do  recall  that  Miss 

S talked  very  interestingly  of  Johan  Bojer  and 

his  work,  and  that  she  was  in  the  midst  of  a  keenly 
analytical  review  of  "The  Great  Hunger"  when  a 
sudden  darkening  of  what  up  to  then  had  been  only 
a  slightly  overcast  sky  reminded  me  that  I  had  been 
extremely  remiss  in  the  matter  of  keeping  an  eye  on 
the  weather.  Indeed,  up  to  that  moment  the  menace 
of  storms  on  the  river  had  been  of  such  small  mo- 
ment as  compared  to  that  of  rapids  that  I  had  come 
to  rate  it  as  no  more  than  negligible.  Now,  however, 
heading  into  the  heart  of  the  Cascades,  I  was  ap- 
proaching a  series  of  gorges  long  notorious  among 
river  voyageurs  as  a  veritable  "wind  factory" — a 
"storm-breeder"  of  the  worst  description.  After  all 
that  I  had  read  of  the  way  in  which  the  early  pioneers 
had  been  held  up  for  weeks  by  head  winds  between 
the  Dalles  and  the  Cascades,  there  was  no  excuse  for 
my  failure  to  keep  a  weather  eye  lifting  at  so  treach- 
erous a  point.  The  only  alibi  I  can  think  of  is  Adam's : 
"The  woman  did  it."  Nor  is  there  any  ungallantry 
in  that  plea.     Quite  the  contrary,  in  fact;  for  I  am 


PALISADE  ROCK,  LOWER  COLUMBIA  RIVER 


MUITNOMAH  FALLS,  t:OLliMHlA  RIVER  11  Kill  WAY,  NEAR  PORTLAND 


THE  HOME  STRETCH  363 

quite  ready  to  confess  that  I  should  probably  fail  to 
watch  the  clouds  again  under  similar  circumstances. 

There  were  a  few  stray  mavericks  of  sunshine 
shafts  trying  to  struggle  down  to  the  inky  pit  of  the 
river  as  I  turned  to  give  the  weather  a  once-over,  but 
they  were  quenched  by  the  sinister  cloud-pall  even  as 
I  looked.  The  whole  gorge  of  the  river-riven  Cas- 
cades was  heaped  full  of  wallowing  nimbus  which, 
driven  by  a  fierce  wind,  was  rolling  up  over  the  water 
like  an  advancing  smoke-barrage.  The  forefront  of 
the  wind  was  marked  by  a  wild  welter  of  foam-white 
water,  while  a  half  mile  behind  a  streaming  curtain 
of  gray-black  indicated  the  position  of  the  advancing 
wall  of  the  rain.  It  would  have  been  a  vile-looking 
squall  even  in  the  open  sea;  here  the  sinister  threat  of 
it  was  considerably  accentuated  by  the  towering  cliffs 
and  the  imminent  outcrops  of  black  rock  studding  the 
surface  of  the  river.  I  had  no  serious  doubt  that 
Imsliallah,  after  all  the  experience  she  had  had  in 
rough  water,  would  find  any  great  difficulty  in  riding 
out  the  blow  where  she  was,  but  since  it  hardly  seemed 
hospitable  to  subject  my  lady  guest  to  any  more  of  a 
wetting  than  could  be  avoided,  I  turned  and  headed 

for  the  lee  shore.     Miss  S was  only  about  half 

muffled  in  the  rubber  saddle  poncho  and  the  light 
"shed"  tent  I  tossed  to  her  before  resuming  my  oars 
when  the  wall  of  the  wind — hard  and  solid  as  the  side 
of  a  flying  barn — struck  us  full  on  the  starboard  beam. 
It  was  rather  careless  of  me,  not  heading  up  to  meet 
that  squall  before  it  struck;  but  the  fact  was  that  I 
simply  couldn't  take  seriously  anything  that  it  seemed 
possible  could  happen  on  such  a  deep,  quiet  stretch  of 


364  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

river.  The  consequence  of  taking  that  buffet  on  the 
beam  was  quite  a  merry  bit  of  a  mix-up.  The  shower- 
bath  of  blown  spray  and  the  dipping  under  of  the 
lee  rail  were  rather  the  least  of  my  troubles.  What 
did  have  me  guessing  for  a  minute,  though,  was  the 
result  of  the  fact  that  that  confounded  fifty-miles-an- 
hour  zephyr  got  under  the  corners  of  the  tent  and, 
billowing  it  monstrously,  carried  about  half  of  it  over- 
board; also  a  somewhat  lesser  amount  of  Miss  S , 

who  was  just  wrapping  herself  in  it.  I  had  to  drop 
my  oars  to  effect  adequate  salvage  operations,  and  so 
leave  the  skiff  with  her  port  gunwale  pretty  nearly 
hove  under.  As  soon  as  I  got  around  to  swing  her 
head  up  into  the  teeth  of  the  wind  things  eased  off  a 
bit. 

The  river  was  about  a  mile  wide  at  this  point — ten 
miles  below  The  Dalles  and  about  opposite  the  station 
of  Rowena — and,  save  for  occasional  outcroppings 
of  black  bedrock,  fairly  deep.  The  north  shore  was 
rocky  all  the  way  along,  but  that  to  the  south  (which 
was  also  the  more  protected  on  account  of  a  jutting 
point  ahead)  was  a  broad  sandy  beach.  That  beach 
seemed  to  offer  a  comparatively  good  landing,  and, 
as  it  extended  up-stream  for  half  a  mile,  it  ajDpeared 
that  I  ought  to  have  no  great  difficulty  in  fetching  it. 
The  first  intimation  I  had  that  this  might  not  be  as 
easy  as  I  had  reckoned  came  when,  in  spite  of  the  fact 
that  I  was  pulling  down-stream  in  a  three  or  four- 
mile  current,  the  wind  backed  the  skiff  up-stream 
past  a  long  rock  island  at  a  rate  of  five  or  six  miles 
an  hour.  That  was  one  of  the  queerest  sensations  I 
experienced  on  the  whole  voyage — having  to  avoid 


THE  HOME  STRETCH  365 

bumping  the  lower  end  of  a  rock  the  while  I  could 
see  the  riffle  where  a  strong  current  was  flowing 
around  the  upper  end. 

I  settled  down  to  pulling  in  good  earnest  after 
that  rather  startling  revelation,  trying  to  hold  the 
head  of  the  skiff  just  enough  to  the  left  of  the  eye  of 
the  wind  to  give  her  a  good  shoot  across  the  current. 
Luckily,  I  had  been  pretty  well  over  toward  the  south 
bank  when  the  wind  struck.  There  was  only  about  a 
quarter  of  a  mile  to  go,  but  I  was  blown  back  just 
about  the  whole  length  of  that  half  mile  of  sandy  beach 
in  making  it.  The  last  hundred  yards  I  was  rowing 
"all  out,"  and  it  was  touch-and-go  as  to  whether  the 
skiff  was  going  to  nose  into  soft  sand  or  the  lower  end 
of  a  long  stretch  of  half-submerged  rocks.  I  was  a 
good  deal  relieved  when  it  proved  to  be  the  beach — 
by  about  twenty  feet.  We  would  have  made  some 
kind  of  a  landing  on  the  rocks  without  doubt,  but 
hardly  without  giving  the  bottom  of  the  boat  an 
awful  banging. 

The  sand  proved  unexpectedly  soft  when  I  jumped 
out  upon  it,  but  I  struck  firm  bottom  before  I  had 
sunk  more  than  an  inch  or  two  above  my  boot  tops 
and  managed  to  drag  the  skiff  up  far  enough  to  es- 
cape the  heaviest  of  the  wash  of  the  waves.  It  was 
rather  a  sodden  bundle  of  wet  canvas  that  I  carried 
out  and  deposited  under  a  pine  tree  beyond  high- 
water  mark,  but  the  core  of  it  displayed  considerable 
life  after  it  had  been  extracted  and  set  up  to  dry  be- 
fore the  fire  of  pitchy  cones  that  I  finally  succeeded 

in  teasing  into  a  blaze.    To  show  Miss  S that  the 

storm  hadn't  affected  my  equanimity,  I  asked  her 


366  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

to  go  on  with  her  review  of  "The  Great  Hunger;"  but 
she  rephcd  her  own  was  more  insistent,  and  reminded 
me  that  I  hadn't  served  lunch  yet.  Well,  rain-soaked 
biscuit  and  milk  chocolate  are  rather  difficult  to  take 
without  a  spoon;  but  a  pound  of  California  seedless 
raisins,  if  munched  slowly,  go  quite  a  way  with  two 
people. 

The  worst  of  the  squall  was  over  in  half  an  hour, 
and,  anxious  to  make  hay  while  the  sun  shone,  I 
pushed  off  again  in  an  endeavor  to  get  on  as  far  as 
I  could  before  the  next  broadside  opened  up.    Miss 

S I  landed  at  the  Rowena  Ferry^  to  catch  the 

afternoon  train  back  to  The  Dalles.  She  was  a  good 
ship-mate,  and  I  greatly  regi'et  she  had  the  bad  luck 
to  be  my  passenger  on  the  only  day  I  encountered  a 
really  hard  blow  in  all  of  my  voyage. 

There  was  another  threatening  turret  of  black 
cloud  beginning  to  train  its  guns  as  I  pulled  out  into 
the  stream  bej^ond  Rowena,  and  it  opened  with  all 
the  big  stuff  it  had  before  I  had  gone  a  mile.  While 
it  lasted,  the  bombardment  was  as  fierce  as  the  first 
one.  Fortunately,  its  ammunition  ran  out  sooner. 
I  kept  the  middle  of  the  current  this  time,  pulling  as 
hard  as  I  could  against  the  wind.  I  got  a  thorough 
raking,  fore-and-aft,  for  my  temerity,  but,  except  at 
the  height  of  the  wind,  I  managed  to  avoid  the  igno- 
miny of  being  forced  back  against  the  stream. 

The  third  squall,  which  opened  up  about  three- 
thirty,  was  a  better  organized  assault,  and  gave  me  a 
pretty  splashy  session  of  it.  When  that  blow  got  the 
range  of  me  I  was  just  pulling  along  to  the  left  of  a 
desolate  tongue  of  black   basalt  called   Memaloose 


THE  HOME  STRETCH  367 

Island.  For  many  centuries  this  rocky  isle  was  used 
by  the  Klickatats  as  a  burial  place,  which  fact  induced 
a  certain  Indian-loving  pioneer  of  The  Dalles,  Vic- 
tor Trevett  by  name,  to  order  his  own  grave  dug 
there.  A  tall  marble  shaft  near  the  lower  end  of  the 
island  marks  the  spot.  ^N'ow  I  have  no  objection  to 
marble  shafts  in  general,  nor  even  to  this  one  in  par- 
ticular— as  a  shaft.  I  just  got  tired  of  seeing  it,  that 
was  all.  If  any  skipper  on  the  Columbia  ever  passed 
Vic  Trevett's  monument  as  many  times  in  a  year  as 
I  did  in  an  hour,  I  should  Hke  to  know  what  run  he 
was  on. 

Swathed  in  oilskins,  my  potential  speed  was  cut 
down  both  by  the  resistance  my  augmented  bulk  of- 
fered to  the  wind  and  the  increased  difficulty  of  pull- 
ing with  so  much  on.  Down  past  the  monument  I 
would  go  in  the  lulls,  and  up  past  the  monument  I 
would  go  before  the  gusts.  There,  relentless  as  the 
Flying  Dutchman,  that  white  shaft  hung  for  the  best 
part  of  an  hour.  I  only  hope  what  I  said  to  the  wind 
didn't  disturb  old  Vic  Trevett's  sleep.  Finally,  a 
quarter  of  an  hour's  easing  of  the  blow  let  me  double 
the  next  point;  and  then  it  turned  loose  with  all  its 
guns  again.  Quite  gone  in  the  back  and  legs,  I  gave 
up  the  unequal  fight  and  started  to  shoot  off  quarter- 
ing toward  the  shore.  Glancing  over  my  shoulder  in 
an  endeavour  to  get  some  kind  of  an  idea  of  where,  and 
against  what,  I  might  count  on  striking,  an  astound- 
ing sight  met  my  eyes,  a  picture  so  weird  and  infernal 
that  I  had  to  pause  (mentally)  and  assure  myself 
that  those  raisins  I  had  for  lunch  had  not  been  "pro- 
cessed." 


368  DOWN  THE  COLU^NIBIA 

Of  all  the  sinister  landscapes  I  ever  saw — including 
the  lava  fields  of  a  good  many  volcanoes  and  a  num- 
ber of  the  world's  most  repulsive  "bad  lands" — that 
which  opened  up  to  me  as  I  tried  to  head  in  beyond 
that  hard-striven-for  point  stands  alone  in  my  mem- 
ory for  sheer  awesomeness.  The  early  winter  twi- 
light had  already  begun  to  settle  upon  the  gloomy 
gorge,  the  duskiness  greatly  accentuating  the  all-per- 
vading murk  cast  upon  the  river  by  the  pall  of  the 
sooty  clouds.  All  round  loomed  walls  of  black  ba- 
salt, reflecting  darkly  in  water  whose  green  had  been 
completely  quenched  by  the  brooding  purple  shadows. 
The  very  pines  on  the  cliffs  merged  in  the  solid 
opacity  behind  their  scraggly  forms,  and  even  the 
fringe  of  willows  above  high-water-mark  looped  round 
the  crescent  of  beach  below  like  a  fragment  of  mourn- 
ing band.  And  that  stretch  of  silver  sand — the  one 
thing  in  the  whole  infernal  landscape  whose  white- 
ness the  gloom  alone  could  not  drown:  how  shall  I 
describe  the  jolt  it  gave  me  when  I  discovered  that 
six  or  seven  black  devils  were  engaged  in  systemati- 
cally spraying  it  with  an  inky  liquid  that  left  it  as 
dark  and  dead  to  the  eye  as  a  Stygian  strand  of  an- 
thracite? It  was  a  lucky  thing  those  raisins  had  not 
been  "processed;"  else  I  might  not  have  remembered 
readily  what  I  had  heard  of  the  way  the  "South- 
Bank"  railway  had  been  keeping  the  sand  from  drift- 
ing over  its  tracks  by  spraying  with  crude  oil  the 
bars  uncovered  at  low  water. 

With  that  infernal  mystery  cleared  up,  my  mind 
was  free  to  note  and  take  advantage  of  a  rather  re- 
markable incidental  phenomenon.     The  effect  of  oil 


THE  HOME  STRETCH  369 

on  troubled  waters  was  no  new  thing  to  me,  for  on  a 
number  of  occasions  I  had  helped  to  rig  a  bag  of  ker- 
osene-soaked oakum  over  the  bows  of  a  schooner 
hove-to  in  a  gale;  but  to  find  a  stretch  of  water  al- 
ready oiled  for  me  at  just  the  time  and  place  I  was  in 
the  sorest  need  of  it — well,  I  couldn't  see  where  those 
manna-fed  Children  of  Israel  wandering  in  the  desert 
found  their  advance  arrangements  looked  to  any  bet- 
ter than  that.  The  savage  wind-whipped  white-caps 
that  were  buffeting  me  in  mid-stream  dissolved  into 
foam-streaked  ripples  the  moment  they  impinged 
upon  the  broadening  oil-sleeked  belt  where  the  petro- 
leum had  seeped  riverward  from  the  sprayed  beach. 
A  solid  jetty  of  stone  could  not  have  broken  the 
rollers  more  effectually.  On  one  side  was  a  wild  wal- 
low of  tossing  water ;  on  the  other — as  far  as  the  sur- 
face of  the  river  was  concerned — an  almost  complete 
calm. 

It  was  a  horrible  indignity  to  heap  upon  Imshallah 
(and,  after  the  way  she  had  displayed  her  resentment 
following  her  garbage  shower  under  the  Wenatchee 
bridge,  I  knew  that  spirited  lady  would  make  me 
pay  dear  for  it  if  ever  she  had  the  chance) ;  still — dead 
beat  as  I  was — there  was  nothing  else  to  do  but  to 
head  into  that  oleaginous  belt  of  calm  and  make  the 
best  of  it.  The  wind  still  took  a  deal  of  bucking,  but 
with  the  banging  of  the  waves  at  an  end  my  progress 
was  greatly  accelerated.  Hailing  the  black  devils  on 
the  bank,  I  asked  where  the  nearest  village  was  con- 
cealed, to  learn  that  Moosier  was  a  couple  of  miles 
below,  but  well  back  from  the  river.  They  rather 
doubted  that  I  could  find  my  way  to  the  town  across 


370  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

the  mudflats,  but  thought  it  might  be  worth  trying  in 
preference  to  pushing  on  in  the  dark  to  Hood  River. 

Those  imps  of  darkness  were  right  about  the  diffi- 
culty of  reaching  Moosier  after  nightfall.  A  small 
river  coming  in  at  that  point  seemed  to  have  deposited 
a  huge  bar  of  quicksand  all  along  the  left  bank,  and 
I  would  never  have  been  able  to  make  a  landing  at 
all  had  not  a  belated  duck -hunter  given  me  a  hand. 
After  tying  up  to  an  oar,  he  very  courteously  under- 
took to  pilot  me  to  the  town  through  the  half-over- 
flowed willow  and  alder  flats.  As  a  consequence  of 
taking  the  lead,  it  was  the  native  rather  than  the  visitor 
who  went  off  the  caving  path  into  the  waist-deep  little 
river.  Coming  out  of  the  woods,  a  hundred-yards  of 
slushing  across  a  flooded  potato-patch  brought  us  to 
the  railway  embankment,  and  from  there  it  was  com- 
paratively good  going  to  the  hotel.  Luckily,  the  lat- 
ter had  a  new  porcelain  tub  and  running  hot  water, 
luxuries  one  cannot  always  be  sure  of  in  the  smaller 
Columbia  River  towns. 

It  was  just  at  the  close  of  the  local  apple  season,  and 
I  found  the  hotel  brimming  over  with  departing  pack- 
ers. Most  of  the  latter  were  girls  from  Southern 
California  orange-packing  houses,  imported  for  the 
season.  Several  of  them  came  from  Anaheim,  and 
assured  me  that  they  had  packed  Valencias  from  a 
small  grove  of  mine  in  that  district.  They  were  a 
good  deal  puzzled  to  account  for  the  fact  that  a  man 
with  a  Valencia  grove  should  be  "hobo-ing"  round 
the  country  like  I  was,  and  seemed  hardly  to  take  me 
seriously  when  I  assured  them  it  was  only  a  matter 
of  a  year  or  two  before  all  farmers  would  be  hobos. 


BRIDGE    ON    COLUMBIA    HIGHWAY    NEAR    PORTLAND,    OREGON 


THE  HOME  STRETCH  371 

It's  funny  how  apple-packing  seems  to  bring  out  all 
the  innate  snobbery  in  a  lady  engaging  in  that  lucra- 
tive calling;  they  didn't  seem  to  think  tramping  was 
quite  respectable.  I  slept  on  the  parlour  couch  until 
three  in  the  morning,  when  I  "inherited"  the  room 
occupied  by  a  couple  of  packettes  departing  by  the 
Portland  train.  As  they  seem  to  have  been  addicted 
to  "attar  of  edelweiss/'  or  something  of  the  kind,  and 
there  hadn't  been  time  for  fumigation,  I  rather  re- 
gretted making  the  shift. 

When  I  had  splashed  back  to  the  river  in  the  morn- 
ing, I  found  that  ImsJiallah  anxious  to  hide  the 
shame  of  that  oil-bath,  had  spent  the  night  trying  to 
bury  herself  in  the  quicksand.  Dumping  her  was 
out  of  the  question,  and  I  sank  mid-thigh  deep  two 
or  three  times  myself  before  I  could  persuade  the 
sulking  minx  even  to  take  the  water.  I  knew  she 
would  take  the  first  chance  that  offered  to  rid  herself 
of  the  filth,  just  as  she  had  before;  but,  with  no  swift 
water  above  the*  Cascades,  there  seemed  small  likeli- 
hood of  her  getting  out-of-hand.  Knowing  that  she 
was  quite  equal  to  making  a  bolt  over  the  top  of  that 
terrible  cataract  if  she  hadn't  managed  to  effect  some 
sort  of  purification  before  reaching  there,  I  made  an 
honest  attempt  at  conciliation  by  landing  at  the  first 
solid  beach  I  came  to  and  giving  her  oily  sides  a  good 
swabbing  down  with  a  piece  of  carpet.  That  seemed 
to  mollify  the  temperamental  lady  a  good  deal,  but 
just  the  same  I  knew  her  too  well  to  take  any  chances. 

Of  all  the  great  rivers  in  the  world,  there  are  only 
two  that  have  had  the  audacity  to  gouge  a  course 
straight  through  a  major  range  of  mountains.  These 


372  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

are  the  Brahmaputra,  which  clove  a  way  through  the 
Himalaya  in  reaching  the  Bay  of  Bengal  from  Tibet, 
and  the  Columbia,  which  tore  the  Cascades  asunder 
in  making  its  way  to  the  Pacific.  But  the  slow  pro- 
cess of  the  ages  by  which  the  great  Asian  river  won  its 
way  to  the  sea  broke  its  heart  and  left  it  a  lifeless 
thing.  It  emerges  from  the  mountains  with  barely 
strength  enough  to  crawl  across  the  most  dismal  of 
deltas  to  lose  its  identity  in  the  brackish  estuaries  at 
its  many  insignificant  mouths.  The  swift  stroke  by 
which  the  Cascades  were  parted  for  the  Columbia 
left  "The  Achilles  of  Rivers"  unimpaired  in  vigour. 
It  rolls  out  of  the  mountains  with  a  force  which  end- 
less fuons  have  not  weakened  to  a  j^oint  where  it  was 
incapable  of  carrying  the  silt  torn  down  by  its  ero- 
sive actions  far  out  into  the  sea.  It  is  the  one  great 
river  that  does  not  run  for  scores,  perhaps  hundreds, 
of  miles  through  a  flat,  monotonous  delta;  the  one 
great  stream  that  meets  the  ocean  strength  for 
strength.  The  Nile,  the  Niger,  the  Amazon,  the 
Yangtse,  the  JNIississippi — all  of  the  other  great  rivers 
— find  their  way  to  the  sea  through  miasmic  swamps; 
only  the  Columbia  finishes  in  a  setting  worthy  of  that 
in  which  it  takes  its  rise.  Nay,  more  than  that.  Su- 
perlative to  the  last  degree  as  is  the  scenery  along  the 
Columbia,  from  its  highest  glacial  sources  in  the 
Rockies  and  Selkirks  right  down  to  the  Cascades, 
there  is  not  a  gorge,  a  vista,  a  panorama,  a  cascade 
of  which  I  cannot  truthfully  say:  "That  reminds  me 
of  something  I  have  seen  before."  The  list  would 
include  the  names  of  most  of  the  scenic  wonders  that 
the  world  has  come  to  know  as  the  ultimate  expression 


THE  HOME  STRETCH  373 

of  the  grand  and  the  sublime;  but  in  time  my  record 
of  comparisons  would  be  complete.  But  for  the  dis- 
tinctive grandeur  of  that  fifty  miles  of  cliff -walled 
gorge  where  the  Columbia  rolls  through  its  Titan- 
torn  rift  in  the  Cascades,  I  fail  completely  to  find  a 
comparison.  It  is  unique;  without  a  near-rival  of  its 
kind. 

Because  so  many  attempts — all  of  them  more  or 
less  futile — have  been  made  to  describe  the  Cascade 
Gorge  of  the  Columbia,  I  shall  not  rush  in  here  with 
word  pictures  where  even  railway  pamphleteers  have 
failed.  The  fact  that  several  of  the  points  I  attained 
in  the  high  Selkirks  are  scarcely  more  than  explored, 
and  that  many  stretches  I  traversed  of  the  upper 
river  are  very  rarely  visited,  must  be  the  excuse  for 
such  essays  at  descriptions  as  I  have  now  and  then 
been  tempted  into  in  the  foregoing  chapters.  That 
excuse  is  not  valid  in  connection  with  the  Cascade 
Gorge,  and,  frankly,  I  am  mighty  glad  of  the  chance 
to  side-step  the  job.  I  must  beg  leave,  however,  to 
make  brief  record  of  an  interesting  "scenic  coinci- 
dence" that  was  impressed  on  my  mind  the  afternoon 
that  I  pulled  through  the  great  chasm  of  the  Cascades. 

It  was  a  day  of  sunshine  and  showers,  with  the 
clouds  now  revealing,  now  concealing  the  towering 
mountain  walls  on  either  hand.  The  almost  continu- 
ous rains  of  the  last  four  days  had  greatly  augmented 
the  flow  of  the  streams,  and  there  was  one  time,  along 
toward  evening,  that  I  counted  seven  distinct  water- 
falls tumbling  over  a  stretch  of  tapestried  cliff  on  the 
Oregon  side  not  over  two  miles  in  length.  And  while 
these  shimmering  ribbons  of  fluttering  satin  were  still 


374  DOWN  THE  COLUINIBIA 

within  eye-scope,  a  sudden  shifting  of  the  clouds  un- 
covered in  quick  succession  three  wonderful  old  vol- 
canic cones — Hood,  to  the  south,  Adams,  to  the  north, 
and  a  peak  which  I  think  must  have  heen  St.  Helens 
to  the  west.  Instantly  the  lines  of  Tennyson's  Lotos 
Eaters  came  to  my  mind. 

"A  land  of  streams !  some,  like  a  downward  smoke. 
Slow-dropping  veils  of  thinnest  lawn,  did  go; 
And  some  thro'  wavering  lights  and  shadows  broke, 
Rolhng  a  slumbrous  sheet  of  foam  below. 
They  saw  the  gleaming  river  seaward  flow 
From  the  inner  land :  far  off,  three  mountain-tops. 
Three  silent  pinnacles  of  aged  snow, 
Stood  sunset-fluslied;  and,  dew'd  with  showery  drops, 
Up-clomb  the  shadowy  pine  above  the  woven  copse." 

Tennyson,  of  course,  was  writing  of  some  tropic 
land  thirty  or  forty  degrees  south  of  Oregon,  for  in 
the  next  verse  he  speaks  of  palms  and  brings  the 
"mild-eyed  melancholy  Lotos-eaters"  swimming 
about  the  keel;  and  yet  there  is  his  description,  per- 
fect to  the  last,  least  word,  of  what  any  one  may  see 
in  a  not-too-cloudy  day  from  the  right  point  on  the 
lower  Columbia. 

The  Hood  and  the  White  Salmon  flow  into  the 
Columbia  almost  opposite  each  other,  the  former  from 
Mount  Hood,  to  the  south,  and  the  latter  from  JNIount 
Adams,  to  the  north.  White  Salmon,  perched  on  the 
mountains  of  the  Washington  side,  is,  so  far  as  I  can 
recall,  the  "Swiss-iest"  looking  village  in  America. 
At  close  range  it  would  doubtless  lose  much  of  its 
picturesqueness,  but  from  the  river  it  is  a  perfect  bit 


THE  HOME  STRETCH  375 

of  the  Tyrol  or  the  Bernese-Oberland.  The  Hood 
River  Valley  is  one  of  the  very  richest  in  all  the  West, 
running  neck-and-neck  with  Yakima  and  Wenatchee 
for  the  Blue  Ribbon  honours  of  North-western  apple 
production.  It  is  also  becoming  a  dairying  centre  of 
considerable  importance.  I  was  genuinely  sorry  that 
my  "through"  schedule  made  it  impossible  to  visit 
a  valley  of  which  I  had  heard  so  much  and  so  favour- 
ably. 

Nearing  the  Cascades,  I  headed  over  close  to  the 
Oregon  bank  for  a  glimpse  of  the  famous  ''sunken 
forest."  This  is  one  of  the  strangest  sights  on  the 
lower  river.  For  a  considerable  distance  I  pulled 
along  the  stumps  of  what  had  once  been  large 
forest  trees,  the  stubby  boles  showing  plainly  through 
the  clear  water  to  a  very  considerable  depth.  There 
is  some  division  of  opinion  as  to  whether  these  trees 
were  submerged  following  the  damming  up  of  the 
river  by  the  slide  which  formed  the  Cascades,  or 
whether  they  have  slid  in  from  the  mountainside  at  a 
later  date.  As  there  is  still  enough  of  a  riverward 
earth-movement  to  necessitate  a  realignment  of  the 
rails  on  the  south  bank  of  the  Cascades,  it  is  probable 
that  the  latter  is  the  correct  theory.  The  self-preser- 
vative character  of  Oregon  pine  is  proverbial,  but  it 
hardly  seems  reasonable  to  believe  that  it  would  last 
through  the  very  considerable  geologic  epoch  that 
must  have  elapsed  since  the  Cascades  were  formed. 

Hugging  the  Oregon  shore  closely,  I  pulled  down 
toward  the  head  of  the  Cascades  canal.  The  water 
continued  almost  lake-like  in  its  slackness  even  after 
the  heavy  rumble  of  the  fall  began  to  beat  upon  the 


376  DOAVN  THE  COLUMBIA 

air.  I  was  taking  no  chances  of  a  last-minute  bolt 
from  the  still  restive  ImshaUah,  however,  and  skirted 
the  sandy  bank  so  closely  that  twice  I  found  myself 
mixed  up  in  the  remains  of  the  past  season's  salmon- 
traps.  Passing  a  big  sawmill,  I  entered  the  canal  and 
kept  rowing  until  I  came  plump  up  against  the  lofty 
red  gates.  An  astonishingly  pretty  girl  who  peered 
down  from  above  said  she  didn't  know  what  a  lock- 
master  was  (being  only  a  passenger  waiting  for  the 
steamer  herself),  but  thought  a  man  hammering  on 
the  other  side  of  the  gate  looked  like  he  might  be 
something  of  that  kind.  She  was  right.  The  lock- 
master  said  he  would  gladly  put  me  through,  but 
would  be  greatly  obliged  if  I  would  wait  until  he 
locked  down  the  steamer,  as  he  was  pretty  busy  at  the 
moment.  That  would  give  me  half  an  hour  to  go 
down  and  size  up  the  tail  of  the  Cascades,  which  I 
would  have  to  run  immediately  on  coming  out  at  the 
foot  of  the  lock. 

There  is  a  fall  of  twentj^-five  feet  at  the  Cascades, 
most  of  it  in  the  short,  sharp  pitch  at  the  head.  It  is 
this  latter  stretch  that  is  avoided  by  the  canal  and 
locks,  the  total  length  of  which  is  about  half  a  mile. 
The  two  lock  chambers  are  identical  in  dimensions, 
each  being  ninety  feet  by  four  hundred  and  sixty-five 
in  the  clear.  They  were  opened  to  navigation  in  1896, 
and  were  much  used  during  the  early  years  of  the 
present  century.  With  the  extension  of  the  rail- 
ways, (especially  with  the  building  of  the  "North- 
bank"  line),  and  the  improvement  of  the  roads,  with 
the  incidental  increase  of  truck-freighting,  it  became 
more  and  more  difficult  for  the  steamers  to  operate 


THE  HOME  STRETCH  377 

profitably  even  on  the  lower  river.  One  after  another 
they  had  been  taken  off  their  runs,  until  the  J.  N. 
Teal,  for  which  I  was  now  waiting,  was  the  last 
steamer  operating  in  a  regular  service  on  the  Colum- 
bia above  Portland. 

Opening  the  great  curving  gates  a  crack,  the  lock- 
master  admitted  Imshallah  to  the  chamber,  from 
where — in  the  absence  of  a  ladder — I  climbed  up  fifty 
feet  to  the  top  on  the  beams  of  the  steel-work.  That 
was  a  pretty  stiff  job  for  a  fat  man,  or  rather  one  who 
had  so  recently  been  fat.  I  was  down  to  a  fairly 
compact  two  hundred  and  twenty  by  now,  but  even 
that  required  the  expenditure  of  several  foot-tons  of 
energy  to  lift  it  out  of  that  confounded  hole.  The 
main  fall  of  the  Cascades  was  roaring  immediately  on 
my  right,  just  beyond  the  narrow  island  that  had  been 
formed  when  the  locks  and  canal  were  constructed. 
It  was  indeed  a  viciously-running  chute,  suggesting  to 
me  the  final  pitch  of  the  left-hand  channel  of  Rock 
Island  Rapids  rather  than  Grand  Rapids,  to  which  it 
is  often  compared.  I  had  heard  that  on  rare  occasions 
steamers  had  been  run  down  here  at  high  water ;  at  the 
present  stage  it  looked  to  me  that  neither  a  large  nor 
a  small  boat  would  have  one  chance  in  a  hundred  of 
avoiding  disaster. 

The  canal  and  locks  avoided  that  first  heavy  fall  of 
the  Cascades  completely,  but  the  swift  tumble  of 
waters  below  was  quite  rough  enough  to  make  a  pre- 
liminary survey  well  worth  while.  The  steamer 
channel  was  on  the  Washington  side,  so  that  it  was 
necessary  for  a  boat  to  head  directly  across  the  cur- 
rent immediately  on  emerging  from  the  lower  lock 


378  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

chamber.  The  Oregon  side  of  the  river  was  thick  with 
rocks  right  away  round  the  bend,  with  not  enough 
clear  water  to  permit  the  passage  of  even  a  skiff.  My 
course,  therefore,  would  have  to  be  the  same  as  that 
of  the  steamer — just  as  sharply  across  to  the  opposite 
side  as  oars  would  take  me.  I  had  put  Inishallah 
through  worse  water  than  that  a  score  of  times,  and, 
while  it  wasn't  the  sort  of  a  place  where  one  would 
want  to  break  an  oar  or  even  catch  a  "crab,"  there  was 
no  reason  to  believe  that  we  should  have  the  least 
trouble  in  pulling  across  the  hard-running  swirls. 
Of  course,  if  Imshallali  really  was  still  smarting  under 
the  indignity  of  that  oilbath.  .  .  .  But  no — I  honestly 
think  there  was  nothing  of  distrust  of  my  well-tried 
little  skiff  behind  my  sudden  change  of  plans.  Rather, 
I  should  say,  it  was  due  to  the  fact  that  a  remark  of  the 
lock-master  had  brought  me  to  a  sudden  realization 
that  I  now  arrived  at  what  I  had  always  reckoned  as 
my  ultimate  objective — tide-water. 

I  had  been  planning  to  run  on  four  miles  farther  to 
Bonneville  that  afternoon,  in  the  hope  of  being  able 
to  pull  through  the  forty  miles  of  slackening  water  to 
Vancouver  the  following  day.  There  I  would  get  a 
tug  to  take  the  skiff  up  the  Willamette  to  Portland, 
where  I  intended  to  leave  her.  As  some  of  the  finest 
scenery  on  the  Columbia  is  passed  in  the  twenty  miles 
below  the  Cascades,  this  promised  me  another  mem- 
orable day  on  the  river — provided  that  there  was  only 
an  occasional  decent  interval  between  showers.  It 
was  the  lock-master's  forecast  of  another  rainy  day, 
together  with  his  assurance  that  the  foot  of  the  locks 
was  generally  rated  as  the  head  of  tide-water,  that 


THE  HOME  STRETCH  379 

prompted  me  to  change  my  mind  a  few  moments  be- 
fore I  was  due  to  pull  out  again  to  the  river,  and  book 
through  to  Portland  on  the  Teal. 

With  the  idea  of  avoiding  the  wash  of  the  steamer, 
I  pulled  down  to  the  extreme  lower  end  of  the  locks 
before  she  entered,  taking  advantage  of  the  interval 
of  waiting  to  trim  carefully  and  look  to  my  oars  for 
the  pull  across  the  foot  of  the  Cascades.  I  was  intend- 
ing to  let  the  Teal  lock  out  ahead  of  me,  and  then  pull 
as  closely  as  possible  in  her  wake,  so  as  to  have  her 
below  me  to  pick  up  the  pieces  in  case  anything  went 
wrong.  It  was  close  to  twilight  now,  with  the  sodden 
west  darkening  early  under  the  blank  grey  cloud- 
mass  of  another  storm  blowing  up-river  from  the  sea. 
If  that  impetuous  squall  could  have  curbed  its  impa- 
tience and  held  off  a  couple  of  minutes  longer,  it 
might  have  had  the  satisfaction  of  treating  me  to  a 
good  soaking,  if  nothing  more.  As  it  was,  I  flung  up 
my  hands  and  kamerad-ed  at  the  opening  pelt  of  the 
big  rain-drops.  Speaking  as  one  Columbia  River 
skipper  to  another,  I  hailed  the  Captain  of  the  J.  N. 
Teal  and  asked  him  if  he  would  take  me  and  my  boat 
aboard. 

"Where  bound?"  he  bawled  back. 

"Portland,"  I  replied. 

"Aw  right.  Pull  up  sta'bo'd  bow  lively — 'fore  gate 
open!" 

A  dozen  husky  roustabouts,  urged  on  by  an  impa- 
tient Mate,  scrambled  to  catch  the  painter  and  give  us 
a  hand-up.  I  swung  over  the  side  all  right,  but  Im- 
shallah,  hanging  back  a  bit,  came  in  for  some  pretty 
rough  pulling  and  hauling  before  they  got  her  on 


380  DOWX  THE  COLUMBIA 

deck.  The  two  of  three  of  her  planks  that  were 
started  in  the  melee  constituted  about  the  worst  in- 
jury the  little  ladj'  received  on  the  whole  voyage. 

And  so  Imshallah  and  I  came  aboard  the  J.  N. 
Teal  to  make  the  last  leg  of  our  voyage  as  passengers. 
The  gates  were  turning  back  before  I  had  reached 
the  upper  deck,  and  a  few  minutes  later  the  power- 
fully-engined  old  stern-wheeler  went  floundering 
across  the  foam-streaked  tail  of  the  Cascades  and  off 
down  the  river.  Castle  Rock — nine  hundred  feet 
high  and  sheer-walled  all  around — was  no  more  than 
a  ghostly  blur  in  the  darkness  as  we  slipped  by  in  the 
still  rapidly  moving  current.  jNIultnomah's  majesty 
was  blanked  behind  the  curtain  of  night  and  a  driving 
rain,  and  only  a  distant  roar  on  the  port  beam  told 
where  one  of  the  loveliest  of  American  waterfalls  took 
its  six-hundred-foot  leap  from  the  brink  of  the  sou- 
thern wall  of  the  river.  Cape  Horn  and  Rooster 
Rock  were  swathed  to  their  foundations  in  streaming 
clouds. 

Once  the  Teal  was  out  on  the  comparatively  open 
waters  of  the  lower  river,  the  Captain  came  down  for 
a  yarn  with  me — as  one  Columbia  skipper  to  another. 
He  had  spent  most  of  his  life  on  the  Snake  and  lower 
Columbia,  but  he  seemed  to  know  the  rapids  and  can- 
yons below  the  Canadian  line  almost  reef  by  reef,  and 
all  of  the  old  skippers  I  had  met  by  reputation.  He 
said  that  he  had  never  heard  of  any  one's  ever  having 
deliberately  attempted  to  run  the  Cascades  in  any- 
thing smaller  than  a  steamer,  although  an  endless  lot 
of  craft  had  come  to  grief  by  getting  in  there  by  acci- 
dent.   The  only  time  a  man  ever  went  through  in  a 


THE  HOME  STRETCH  381 

small  boat  and  came  out  alive  was  about  ten  years 
ago.  That  lucky  navigator,  after  drinking  most  of 
a  Saturday  night  in  the  town,  came  down  to  the  river 
in  the  dim  grey  dawn  of  a  Sunday,  got  into  his  boat 
and  pushed  off.  It  was  along  toward  church-time 
that  a  ferry-man,  thirty  miles  or  more  down  river, 
picked  up  a  half  filled  skiff.  Quietly  sleeping  in  the 
stern-sheets,  with  nothing  but  his  nose  above  water, 
was  the  only  man  that  ever  came  through  the  Cas- 
cades in  a  small  boat. 

The  Captain  looked  at  me  with  a  queer  smile  after 
he  told  that  story.  "I  don't  suppose  you  were  heeled 
to  tackle  the  Cascades  just  like  that?"  he  asked  finally. 

And  so,  for  the  last  time,  I  was  taken  for  a  boot- 
legger. But  no — not  quite  the  last.  I  believe  it  was 
the  porter  at  Hotel  Portland  who  asked  me  if — ahem! 
— if  I  had  got  away  with  anything  from  Canada. 
And  for  all  of  that  incessant  trail  of  smoke,  no  fire — 
or  practically  none. 

The  day  of  my  arrival  in  Portland  I  delivered  Im- 
shallah  up  to  the  kindest-faced  boat-house  proprietor 
on  the  Willamette  and  told  him  to  take  his  time  about 
finding  her  a  home  with  some  sport-loving  Oregonian 
who  knew  how  to  treat  a  lady  right  and  wouldn't 
give  her  any  kind  of  menial  work  to  do.  I  told  him  I 
didn't  want  to  have  her  work  for  a  living  under  any 
conditions,  as  I  felt  she  had  earned  a  rest ;  and  to  im- 
press upon  whoever  bought  her  that  she  was  high- 
spirited  and  not  to  be  taken  liberties  with,  such  as 
subjecting  her  to  garbage  shower-baths  and  similar 
indignities.  He  asked  me  if  she  had  a  name,  and  I 
told  him  that  she  hadn't — any  more;  that  the  one  she 


382  DOWN  THE  COLUMBIA 

had  been  carrying  had  ceased  to  be  in  point  now  her 
voyage  was  over.  It  had  been  a  very  appropriate 
name  for  a  boat  on  the  Columbia,  though,  I  assured 
him,  and  I  was  going  to  keep  it  to  use  if  I  ever  made 
the  voyage  again. 

Portland,  although  it  is  not  directly  upon  the  Co- 
lumbia, has  always  made  that  river  distinctively  its 
own.  I  had  realized  that  in  a  vague  way  for  many 
years,  but  it  came  home  to  me  again  with  renewed 
force  now  that  I  had  arrived  in  Portland  after  having 
had  some  glimpse  of  every  town  and  village  from  the 
Selkirks  to  the  sea.  (Astoria  and  the  lower  river  I 
had  known  from  many  steamer  voyages  in  the  past.) 
Of  all  the  thousands  living  on  or  near  the  Colum- 
bia, those  of  Portland  still  struck  me  as  being  the 
ones  who  held  this  most  strikingly  individual  of  all  the 
world's  rivers  at  most  nearly  its  true  value.  With 
Portlanders,  I  should  perhaps  include  all  of  those 
living  on  the  river  from  Astoria  to  The  Dalles.  These, 
too,  take  a  mighty  pride  in  their  great  river,  and  re- 
gard it  with  little  of  that  distrustful  reproach  one  re- 
marks so  often  on  the  upper  Columbia,  where  the 
settlers  see  it  bearing  past  their  parched  fields  the 
water  and  the  power  that  would  mean  the  difference 
to  them  between  success  and  disaster.  When  this 
stigma  has  been  wiped  out  by  reclamation  (as  it  soon 
will  be),  without  a  doubt  the  plucky  pioneers  of  the 
upper  Columbia  will  see  in  their  river  many  beauties 
that  escape  their  troubled  eyes  to-day. 

The  early  Romans  made  some  attempt  to  give  ex- 
pression to  their  love  of  the  Tiber  in  monuments  and 
bridges.    It  would  be  hard  indeed  to  conceive  of  any- 


THE  HOME  STRETCH  383 

thing  in  marble  or  bronze,  or  yet  in  soaring  spans  of 
steel,  that  would  give  adequate  expression  to  the  pride 
of  the  people  of  the  lower  Columbia  in  their  river;  and 
so  it  is  a  matter  of  felicitation  that  they  have  sought  to 
pay  their  tribute  in  another  way.  There  was  inspira- 
tion behind  the  conception  of  the  idea  of  the  Columbia 
Highway,  just  as  there  was  genius  and  rare  imagina- 
tion in  the  carrying  out  of  that  idea.  I  have  said 
that  the  Cascade  Gorge  of  the  Columbia  is  a  scenic 
wonder  apart  from  all  others;  that  it  stands  without 
a  rival  of  its  kind.  Perhaps  the  greatest  compliment 
that  I  can  pay  to  the  Columbia  Highway  is  to  say 
that  it  is  worthy  of  the  river  by  which  it  runs. 


(the  end) 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 

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